Disassembled
by FarSide0013
Summary: DPV Part III: Magneto continues to bring new mutants to Avalon, while the X-Men deal with tension from outside the mansion as well as in. All the while, something darker is lurking in the shadows, and Wanda's mind is cracking.
1. Chapter 1

**Days of Past's Visions **

**Part III: Disassembled**

**1**

Though she had yet to outright admit it to herself, Wanda Maximoff was going crazy.

After the nightmare brought about by Dani Moonstar ended, Wanda thought everything was okay and anything she had felt or saw was a creation of the other girl's powers. The nervousness she felt when she looked at her father was just leftover jitters from the experience that would pass in a few days. Or so she told herself. In reality, the uneasy feeling she had any time her father was near only seemed to get worse. She found herself ducking out meetings with him quickly, giving pitiful excuses as to why she could not sit down for meals with him any longer, all in hopes of avoiding whatever it was she was feeling when he was near. It wasn't outright fear, more along the lines of distrust and anger.

Thinking taking time away from him might help her get over her issues since spending time with him was clearly not, she found that the same feelings were soon spreading to her thoughts about others, namely the fellow Bayville Brotherhood members. Whatever was happening involved the others she knew from before Avalon. She continually forced herself to think all of this was just irrational paranoia; she was just being silly and needed to get over it. Everyone did not suddenly turn against her and any anger she did feel towards her friends should be because they did something to deserve it. That of course was something they did constantly, so she found some comfort in that.

Until the nightmares started.

They were always the same, vague memories of running down never ending corridors. No matter what twist or turn she took, she could never escape. The few windows she found were barred shut, though through them she could see horrifically burned landscapes. Each time she had the dream she would run until she could see an open door in the distance, and each time metal bars would slam down over the portal blocking her path. It was then that she would wake up covered in cold sweat, panting heavily, the dream quickly fading from her memory. Even though she could not then fall back asleep, for the first week she found them to just be a strange annoyance. As terrible as they were, she never thought of them as more than bad dreams, maybe the result of something she ate or more likely just a reaction to the stress of her newfound paranoia. She almost found it funny, having anxiety over having anxiety. But in the end, a series of unremembered nightmares was nothing new to Wanda; she recalled having suffered from some when she was a small child after Pietro had tricked her into watching a scary movie. She hoped they would end after some time and was not overly concerned.

She determined to get over her random emotional issues by forcing herself to be around her friends and working through whatever was affecting her. Wanda was a member of the Bayville Brotherhood, a title of self importance they had begun using to distinguishing themselves from the others on the island. While she didn't necessarily like everyone in the group, it was better than mingling with the strangers. The group, which consisted of those originally recruited by Mystique and Magneto, had stuck together during the influx of new mutants onto the island. Still misfits and outsiders, they were enjoying an odd reversal of popularity due to not only their place on the Acolytes, Avalon's defenders, but also for their place as the first teens Magneto reached out to in Bayville. When not busy with the new training regiments organized by Bishop, the group liked to come and hang out at the same small café they had found when first arrived on the island. Many passersby would give them looks of awe and even wave at them in hopes of getting some sort of acknowledgement in response. Despite all of this attention, they did not mix often with the other mutants. Some, like Blob and Toad, maintained they did this to keep the air of mystery and coolness they now had. Others, like Pietro, pointed out that it would all be lost once someone got a good whiff of Toad. The only new people in they allowed into their group were Calvin "Mimic" Rankin and Cassandra Nova, although the latter was usually too busy finding new mutants using Cerebra to spend much time with the Bayville teens.

She stayed with her friends as much as possible in hopes that a bit of normality would chase away the fleeting memories picked up the night before. For a short time it seemed to work. The dreams faded quicker when she woke up in the morning and she even found herself looking forward to the day's activities. In another area of her life she wasn't being entirely honest with herself about, most of that had to do with Mimic. When her father had first rescued the boy from the Vault, she had been leery of him, but she had quickly warmed up to him after learning a bit about his past. Now she thought the power copying mutant was decent enough, and had quite a few qualities that made him stand out from the rest of her friends. He was intelligent, but not overwhelmingly so, good looking but not perfect, and most of all he wasn't a jerk. He usually went out his way to prove that to her, but it was welcome change from the year and a half that she lived in the Bayville boarding house. Mimic also had a certain way with Toad that kept the pest out of her hair. Even though she was fully capable of dealing with Toad, and usually did so with a pleasurable satisfaction, Mimic did his best to keep him in line for Wanda. She knew he was doing his best to both get on Wanda's good side and to show her he had a more chivalrous personality compared to the other Brotherhood boys. She hadn't made up her mind if it was endearing and appreciated it or if it was annoying but useful, since it did keep her from having to talk to Toad, but either way she still found herself attracted to the newest member in her circle of friends. His presence was a refreshing change and did help with her deteriorating mental problems.

But unfortunately the small peace she found didn't last. At the end of the second week after her nightmares first began, she started having waking visions.

They started as glimpses of something out of the corner of her eye, but upon spinning quickly to check, there would be nothing. From there it progressed to seeing creatures in crowds, men formed out what looked like liquid metal who would disappear into the ground before Wanda could truly react. Then bits of the world would look as if they had turned to rust and burnt wood, metal gratings and iron bars appearing where there had been none before, always reverting to normal as if nothing had occurred. Any time she mentioned what she had just seen, or asked if anyone else had seen it, they passed it off as if it was nothing, or perhaps just a trick of the light. Or worse, that she was crazy. Crazy was a word quickly becoming taboo for Wanda. Eventually she stopped speaking to anyone about what she was seeing and tried her best to ignore it.

The day she finally found something that would help her was also the day whatever was going on in her head decided it would not be ignored.

It had been a normal afternoon for Wanda and her friends when she had a hallucination so horrible that she had fled in terror. Toad was being particularly foul that day, even for him, by practically sitting on Wanda's shoulder as he stood on the table speaking nonsense to her about their supposed relationship. She had glanced over to Mimic to see if he would once again step in for her. But on this particular day Mimic was focusing on a lesson from Lance on controlling earthquakes, leaving Wanda to fend off Toad alone. With a deep, frustrated sigh, Wanda had begun to tap her power, toying with the idea of causing Toad's own tongue to strangle him when something snapped.

The trapped feelings she was already having with Toad so close intensified beyond anything she had experienced before, the entire world felt as if it was collapsing in on her. A deafening roar filled her ears as the world around her began to melt, the horrors she had only experienced in full when her powers accidentally intensified the X-brat Mirage's powers filled the void left by the disappearance of normality. Her friends were replaced by the metal creatures she had seen darting in and out of crowds, the silver sheen reflecting the rust color the sky and landscape seemed to take on.

"Not real, not real," she said to herself, holding her fingertips to her temples. The creatures began to move towards her as the noise continued to ring in her ears, the air grew hot and choking, the rusted, charred metal buildings leaned in towards her to swallow her whole, the ground burned her feet. Panicked began to overtake her as the sky above her cracked with lightening and thunder, and a burning wind rushed around her as the creatures shuffled within arm's length. Throwing her arms over her head, she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to block out what was happening around her, willing it to be some sort of dream.

Gurgling noises started coming from around her, strained voices that whispered phrases she could barely make out. "Lock her up...never wanted...better off without her... trouble...kill her...hate her... one of us!" She tried to scream but her throat closed up, the searing air cutting off any hope of making a sound. She tried to use her powers, but nothing but laughter echoed in her ears.

She jumped back as something touched her shoulder. Looking up, the world was normal again and Pietro's hand rested gently on her shoulder. "You okay Sis? No need to freak out or anything. It's just Toad being Toad."

She looked around. The others, while not moved from their spots like Pietro, were looking intently at her. The sun shone brightly on all of them as a gentle breeze cooled the air down to pleasant temperatures, and the buildings offered just enough shade to make it a delightful spot. Somewhere nearby she could hear a couple of kids playing. "Yeah I'm fine, just a really bad headache. I'm going to go lay down." She stood and headed down the street before they could ask any more questions. She could hear Toad calling out to her and Mimic grabbing him and forcing him back down, but she ignored it and turned the corner. Clear of their sight, she took off in a run.

She ran as far as she could away from everyone, out of the city and into the small woods that lay on one side of the island. She eventually came out of the trees to a small park nestled on the edge of the island that she had never been to before. Collapsing on the ground, she held her hands in her head as she stared at the waves crashing into the cliff bases below. She was on the verge of tears, a feeling she hadn't experienced since it had looked like Apocalypse had killed her father. A jolt of pain shot through her head at the mere thought of her father. She had the distinct impression that he would be very upset to know anything was wrong with her, which was precisely why she had not mentioned anything to him. He didn't like weakness, no matter how much it seemed he doted on her well being.

She raised her head in defiance. "I am not weak," she said aloud to the sky, tears beginning to stream down her face. She stood, ready to face whatever craziness appeared in her life with the inner fire the daughter of Magneto should have when instead she came face to face with Kwannon, her father's silent bodyguard. The ninja also known as Revanche was not in her customary black jumpsuit with a sword strapped across her back, but instead wore a cream colored gi of comfortable looking cotton, held in place with her normal pouched utility belt. Her deep purple hair was tied back into a loose ponytail with a black ribbon. She was also standing very close, staring directly at Wanda which caused the younger girl to stumble back away from her to avoid running into the woman who had suddenly appeared.

Wanda was afraid of two things in life, the ever worsening visions she was seeing and the pale purple eyes of the young ninja, which everyone agreed were cold and lifeless, full of a deadly indifference to most of the world, the deadly aspect enhanced by the blade shaped tattoo that ran down the left side of her face. Wanda was therefore very surprised to see a look of near concern emanating from Revanche.

Finding that look almost as unnerving as the cold indifference, Wanda attempted to move around the shadow walker. Kwannon again stepped in front of her. "What do you want? Get out of the way!'

The purple haired mutant stepped forward and grabbed Wanda by the shoulders, turning her back to the cliff. With a wave of her hand, she indicated Wanda should return to the ground near the edge. "Fine, whatever, I'll sit down. We going to have a conversation?"

Wanda went and sat back down on the grass, while Kwannon knelt beside her. She made a movement with her hand indicating Wanda should do the same. "What? Meditating? I don't think so, my mind is perfectly focused or Zen or whatever," she said as she made to stand. With Pietro like speed the ninja reached out and grabbed the other girl's wrist and pulled her back into place. "I told you, I'm-" she looked over to see Kwannon simply looking at her with a raised eyebrow. "Okay, so my heads a mess. But I don't see how sitting here dwelling on it is going to help me at all."

The mute girl shook her head. She attempted to sign something but Wanda stopped her. "I don't know sign language." Kwannon paused for a moment, then pointed at her forehead and made a wave of her hand. "Chop off your head? I don't get it." With an exasperated sigh, Kwannon dug into one of the pouches on her belt and pulled out a small pad of paper and the stub of a pencil. With quick, precise movements she jotted down three words, tore off the top sheet and handed it to Wanda as she tucked the rest of her writing material back into the pouch.

"You mean you've had paper the whole time? Why are you wasting my time with your mime act when you could have just written something out? The whole mysterious ninja crap is really clichéd anyways."

Kwannon just glared at her, then jabbed a finger at the unread paper in Wanda's hand.

Rolling her eyes, Wanda looked down. "Fine. 'Clear your mind.' Wow, that's such great advice, thank you oh wise one. All my problems are—" Kwannon reached out and grabbed Wanda's lips, forcing them shut. With her other hand she tapped Wanda's forehead, and again made the wiping motion. She moved back to again kneel next to her.

"Okay, clear my mind, I get it. Why not, can't be as bad as trying to talk to a mute girl who refuses to--" she cut short as she caught site of the again glaring bodyguard. With a sigh, Wanda closed her eyes and tried to focus on nothing, if for no other reason than to escape the awkward situation. Part of her also liked this new challenge, as it at least took her mind off of everything that had happened to her that afternoon. It took some work, and more mimed instructions from Kwannon such as how to breathe or sit properly, but as the sun began to set of the waters in the horizon Wanda felt calmer than she had in months.

Kwannon stood and helped Wanda back to her feet. With a nod and almost a smile, the woman made to leave. Wanda reached out and grabbed her shoulder. "Wait, why did you do this? You always seemed so, I don't know, heartless?"

Her brow furled in concentration for a moment, and then she reached back into one of her belt pouches and pulled out the bit of pencil. She reached her other hand out to Wanda, who handed back the piece of paper. Turning it over, Kwannon wrote something quickly in her short, angled letters. She handed the slip back to Wanda. She turned and walked away before the other mutant could even turn it over to read it. As Kwannon reached the tree line, shadows leapt out from the ground and behind the trees, enveloping the girl completely. In a matter of moments it was as if she had never been there.

Looking down, Wanda read the note. "I know how hard it is to be haunted by the past."

-------------

That had been two months ago. Wanda didn't know what the cryptic note had meant then and still didn't, as she couldn't remember anything so horrible in her past as to cause the nightmare she was now living in. Yet whenever things became too bad she would return to the park and meditate. The strange waking dreams still happened, and their frequency was picking up, but she had not experienced anything nearly as bad as that particular afternoon. She still carried the slip of paper, a reminder both to relax her mind and that she was not alone, that someone out there at least understood some of what she was going through. She never had, well she couldn't call it a conversation, but time alone with Kwannon again, though the few times they passed each other on the streets or in a hallway the warrior had turned her head to Wanda and raised an eyebrow, to which Wanda would usually respond with a nod or, if no one was around who would mock her for doing something odd, respond with the same motion Kwannon had used to tell her to clear her mind. Either would earn her the nod and near smile Wanda had determined was as close to a sign of happiness as the purple haired girl knew how to give.

Kwannon was not the only person who was helping Wanda cope with whatever was happening to her. As she stood up this day after her daily meditation, a voice called out to her. Wanda turned to see Cassandra Nova coming down the path through the trees. The teenage daughter of Juggernaut had refused to pick what Magneto called a true name, and allowed only her father to call her anything other than Cassandra. She was the same age as Wanda, and the two had built an unusual friendship over the few months since Cassandra was freed from the Vault. She was far more girly in most things than the tomboy Wanda was, and in Wanda's eye, the type of girl who seemed to talk incessantly about anything and everything if given the opportunity. Ordinarily Wanda would have strangled a girl like that, but Cassandra had a way of shutting up right before Wanda could reach out. She suspected it was Cassandra's telepathic powers reading Wanda's mind to find the exact moment to quit, but Cassandra vehemently denied ever reading her mind. Wanda did find small comfort at least that Cassandra didn't throw in filler words of "like" or "you know" every two seconds the way that insufferable Pryde girl once did. Cassandra was just excitable. She had lived for so long without a friend due to her father and her own mutation that she was desperate to do all the things she missed as a child and believed she had found a kindred spirit in that way in Wanda. Wanda herself couldn't explain it, but she too seemed to have a similar empty spot in her life that Cassandra filled. She attributed it to growing up with an annoying twin brother and then being in the Bayville Brotherhood house.

Wanda was also fascinated with the sinister streak in Cassandra. The dichotomy between seemingly friendly, happy girl and the girl who liked to plant suggestions in Toad's mind that a mob of hungry Frenchmen were after him was very amusing to Wanda. Cassandra also had many of the same interests as Wanda, taste in music and books, and attitude towards the Brotherhood and humanity to help further support the bond between them.

Despite this somewhat odd friendship, when it came to her problems Wanda had decided not to talk to anyone about them, even Cassandra. But somehow Cassandra always seemed to be there at the right moment to distract Wanda, and she was grateful for that. Today's meditation had helped with the stress she was feeling during the morning, but she had the nagging feeling things would get worse if she didn't keep things in check. Cassandra's appearance in the park offered a nice distraction from thinking about it too much.

"Hey Wanda, there you are, Cal is looking for you. Oh my God this place is beautiful! When did you find it?"

"Few months ago, maybe. What did Mimic want?"

Cassandra frowned. "Mimic is a stupid name. You people with your stupid code names, like you're secret agents or fighter pilots or a bunch of ten year old boys. What kind of name is the Scarlet Witch anyways? Doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, does it? And come on, it's not like you don't answer to Wanda. Not many people call you Scarlet Witch, why's it okay for you to not have a silly name?"

Wanda ignored the jabs at her. "He likes Mimic and he mimics other people's powers."

"Sure, it makes sense but it still sounds lame to be walking around calling yourself Mimic. Anyways, I came out here for something. What was it?"

"Mimic is looking for me?" Wanda said, an eyebrow raised at her friend. Those that met Cassandra learned early on that she often became side tracked in conversation, most likely a side effect from having access to so many random thoughts floating around.

"Oh, right, Cal. I don't know why he wants to see you, probably to make out or something, he's crushing pretty bad. If I were you I'd go for it, he's a pretty good looking guy and he's already keep the toad away from you. And he's not thinking about sex, Cal I mean. Well, not all the time at least, which believe me is really good for a guy his age. Kinda disgusting when you think about it all though. Anyways, where was I?" She took a second to breathe and think. "Cal," she said, pointing a finger to emphasis her return to the main conversation point. "He was just asking about you and I told him I'd see if I could find you, which, since I can hook myself to a machine and find any mutant in the world I want to find, would seem easier then it really was. So, what's up? Why you all the way out here?" She sat down on the table of a picnic bench that was close to the trees.

"Nothing, just out here clearing my mind."

"Cool. I tried to do that once, but since half the time I can hear what's in everyone else's head too, it didn't help much. Though maybe I could just mind wipe everyone around me…" she trailed off, her head tilting up and to the right to in thought.

"Doesn't it defeat the purpose of being a mind reader if there are no minds to read?"

Cassandra brightened at this idea. "Good point Wan!"

Wanda sat down on the bench and leaned back against the table. "Don't you ever get overwhelmed?"

"All the time. Especially if I'm sitting in Cerebra because it's a power supercharger for someone like me."

"How do you deal with it?"

"I dunno, I just do. But I also found out that you have to figure out what's causing your problem, what's the real reason you feel overwhelmed and then just face it. Everything else is just a symptom. Take me for example. When I first got my powers I would freak out all the time because I'd be hearing voices and having thoughts that weren't mine, and not matter what I did I couldn't stop them. But really it wasn't that I heard them, 'cause I knew there was no way to stop hearing them all together, my mind was always going to be picking up these stray thoughts. Plus I really like looking in people's heads. The problem was that I was scared about not having full control and so I was trying to stop something I couldn't. Eventually I decided to stop fighting it. Instead of trying to push the voices out and close myself off from hearing them all together, I just started filtered them out, stopped paying attention to them. I mean, if you're in a crowded room and everyone's talking, you can't shut them all up or turn off your ears, so you just tune them out and get back to flirting with the cute guy who will probably buy you a drink if you play your cards right. Or rather, get back to giving him the mental suggestion that he's going to buy you a drink. You get the picture."

Wanda leaned over, resting her elbows on her knees and staring down at the grass. "I have no idea what my problem really is, and I don't think not fighting it is the answer."

"Sometime you just have to go with the flow Wan, you can't stop the inevitable."

"What if the flow and inevitable is you going crazy?"

"You're not going crazy Wanda. You're just a teenager. It's normal. I learned that one early too."

Wanda frowned. She could tell Cassandra about what was going on, but she didn't think her friend was right. Whatever was happening to her wasn't normal, something had caused it and if she could figure out what, she knew it would all go away.

"Still, Cassandra continued, "I'd dig through your mind if it would make you feel better, but it's a really messed up place. Not crazy messed up, 'cause that would be bad and all. No, definitely not crazy. It's just… wired differently. It's like a castle or something, lots of walls and stuff blocking your thoughts. Very cool natural defenses. But not that I know for sure, no, not me. I've never tried to go through your mind, honestly. I just don't get stray thoughts off of you. Um, yeah. You know I'll help you any other way I can though, right?"

"Thanks Cassandra, I know," Wanda nodded. There was a lull in the conversation, and the brunette began picking at Wanda's short hair. Wanda swatted her hand away. "What are you doing!"

"You need to grow out your hair so I can braid it.

Wanda rolled her eyes. "I loathe you."


	2. Chapter 2

**2**

While the past few months had been a growing nightmare for Wanda on Avalon, across the globe it had been a mild winter for the students in Bayville at the Xavier Institute, both in temperature and in activity. There had been no appearances by Magneto, break-ins by mutants seeking sanctuary, or pharaohs resurrected to complete their plans of world domination. The students of the institute spent the winter worrying about school, holiday shopping, and training for whatever problem did arise next.

The same day that Wanda and Cassandra sat in the park contemplating how to avoid feeling overwhelmed, Charles Xavier was sitting with his teaching staff in his study, enjoying a morning cup of tea and discussing the state of the Institute.

"You were there Chuck, the kids working better together than ever before," Logan said as he turned to look out the window the bench he was sitting in was built into. In the driveway below a group of the students, cleaned up from their morning workouts, were piling into a van for a trip to the mall. Logan couldn't help but give a crooked smile at some of the antics in the chaotic mass. Kitty made straight for the driver's seat of the van, only to be blocked by Kurt teleporting behind the wheel first. She was pulled away from the driver's door mid-tantrum by Bobby, who picked Kitty up by the waist, carried her to the side door and pushed her in. Logan could also see Laura being dragged by Amara and Tabitha. Logan knew if she had been asked by any one in the mansion other than those two, she would have gone willingly. Alex, Dani and Piotr came from the mansion's front door next, Alex animatedly explaining something to the tall Russian while the young Cheyenne hung on his every word. While Piotr's walk was as stoic and rigid as always, the young man was grinning in amusement.

Logan brought his attention back to the study as the engine of the van fired up. "I thought maybe the quiet would make them go soft, but it looks like it helped, made for some good morale."

"I agree," Ororo said after finishing a sip of tea. "I believe that without the pressure of an upcoming conflict or the sting of a recent one, the students have been able to focus on the tasks in front of them rather than in their minds."

"Oh, I am afraid there are still quite a number battles fought in their minds," Hank said as he brushed muffin crumbs from his furry mouth. "Many have expressed feelings of anxiety over a number of subjects, ranging from their defeat at the Vault to fear about being unprepared like your students in San Francisco were."

Xavier's hand paused before reaching his mouth. Letting out a long sigh, he placed the tea cup back into the saucer. "It is a thought that is never far from their minds since Erik told the tale. Yet one more dark thought that clouds our path. Still, as you pointed out Logan, their morale and resilience is impressive."

"My memory may be mostly a blur, but I've got enough training built in like instinct to know these kids are ready Charles. No way what happened before could happen again. I'd almost like to see someone try a snatch. It'd be a hell of a show."

"Your vote of confidence is assuring Logan," Charles said with a weak smile. "But here are some horrors that training cannot prepare them for."

"On a less dour note," Ororo said with a look at both of them, "the new additions to the Institute appear to be adjusting well. Even Laura appears to be adapting to her new life."

Logan let out a small laugh. "Yeah, probably even more if some of the others would stop expecting her to share their fashion obsession."

"Their ability to welcome newcomers, even those who were once their enemies, is a testament to your dream Professor," Hank added. "They are truly remarkable young people."

"I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly Piotr was accepted. He is a gentle soul and I didn't anticipate any problems, but it was still far faster than I expected. And even Remy has found a place after some time. I agree with all of you, that it is a sign of hope." Xavier pulled his chair back enough to look out the window past Logan at the van speeding off through the gates. He turned back to the other two. "One of the points I wanted to touch on in today's meeting is your opinions on inviting more students to the mansion."

Beast and Storm shared a look while Logan remained expressionless.

"Well," Ororo began, turning back to meet Xavier's eyes, "from a logistics standpoint we may not be able to handle more students. The mansion is large, but space could become an issue if we add another class the same size as the original New Mutants. And while the four of us, along with help from Jean and Scott, are able to take care of classes, it is mostly because the majority of the students have advanced quite far with their powers."

"And let us not forget Jean and Scott both expressed a need for more time to devote to their studies this semester," Hank said.

"Yes, and I do have some plans in regards to their situation. Also, I had not planned on adding any new students until the fall, though situations being what they are with mutant and human relations, I have every intention of keeping our doors open to any who would like to join."

"Who do you have in mind?" Logan said, his tone as neutral as his gruff voice would allow.

"As you know there are several mutants I have been in contact with before who have rejected invitations. Regardless, the invitations have always stood as open should they ever wish to come to the school. I plan on extending those invitations again to emphasize they have a refuge here should they seek it, and I will continue making contact with any mutant Cerebro detects. But thus far the only invitation I have forthright sent is to the Lee's, asking if they would allow Jubilation to return."

"I take it they have rejected your offer again?" Ororo asked.

"Yes, but with much less contempt than before. I like to view it as a small victory."

"They won't give in," Logan said dismissively. "Things have been quiet lately, but the hatred is still simmering out there. The mansion's still a target and the kid's parents know it."

"Charles," Hank began hesitantly. He took a moment before he began to speak. "Is this hope to increase the ranks of the Institute a reaction to Magneto? I am always behind you in keeping the doors open to any who need help, even if I'm teaching a class of fifty students at once. But if these thoughts of expansion are merely a need to match Magneto's numbers..."

"Hank's right. I'm not taking a bunch of newbies against the Brotherhood," Logan said, standing up and moving to stand on the other side of the oak desk. He placed his hands on the edge and leaned in. "I'd rather make a stand with those we have then a bunch of raw recruits who would get themselves killed."

"Logan! Do you honestly believe the Professor would endanger children that way?" Ororo exclaimed.

"Considering we have a room downstairs that starts with 'Danger,' the thought crossed my mind. Listen Chuck, I have no doubts about what I'm here to teach these kids, and I have no problems taking the ones we have now into a fight, because I know they have what it takes to come back alive. That's what it'll take to beat Magneto, not throwing bodies at him."

"Please, Logan, Hank, I assure you I have no intentions of doing any such thing," Charles said, his hands outstretched and waving Logan to sit. The feral mutant grimaced once before sitting in the chair that had originally been pulled over for him.

"I admit, when we first discovered what Magneto had done to Cerebro and realized his intentions in rescuing a telepath from the Vault, I considered the possibility of gathering as many mutants as I could to hopefully stop his plans. But I soon remembered that that is not our purpose here. We will oppose Magneto and those like him when the time comes, but until then it will be business as usual for us. We will continue to teach peaceful coexistence with humans and responsibility with our gifts. My purpose in bringing new students is simply that I believe we can handle more as our current students grow older, and right now there is an ever growing number of mutants who could use our assistance."

"Do you feel it is wise to invite more students here, given the darkness you've seen?" Ororo asked softly.

"My conversation with Destiny several months ago was the starting point of these thoughts. She reminded me not all that I saw was darkness, that we can still have a bright future. There is always hope."

"What the latest about what Magneto is up to anyways?" Logan asked.

"My latest estimate has his numbers at several hundred, although the vast majority of those are not being trained to fight. They are mostly mutants seeking refuge from the troubles of the world. In that respect Erik is doing the work he and I always set out to do. There is however a select few he is training, though it would appear that these are mostly mutants we've encountered before and are about equal to our numbers."

"Should we be expecting an attack of some sort?"

Charles shook his head. "No. It appears that he is content in only creating a protection force at the moment. I do believe that will change someday, but not soon"

Logan let out a small laugh. "Should I even bother askin' where you're getting your intel from?"

Xavier smiled gently. "With the number of mutants heading to Avalon, there are quite a few I've spoken with before who were more than happy to at least let me know everything was safe there."

There was a knock of the door and the three teachers turned their heads at the sound. Xavier simply smiled again and sent out a telepathic message. "Come in Rogue, thank you for coming."

The door opened and in walked the young woman. She had a bit more skin exposed then normal, knowing most people were out of the mansion. Her fishnet shirt over a black ribbed tank top showed off a great deal of her pale skin, with even more being exposed in ripped holes on each kneecap in her faded blue jeans. Her black boots caused echoes in the room as she walked across the hardwood floor of the threshold and came to a halt, frozen under the watchful eyes of the four adult members of the Institute. She pushed her trademark white bangs from her coal ringed eyes, moving it back into her auburn hair with her gloved fingers as she looked at each of the teachers and back to Xavier.

"Am Ah in trouble or somethin'?"

The Professor gave a reassuring smile. "Of course not Rogue. We were just finishing a staff meeting and I thought it best if they heard what I wanted to ask you. Please have a seat," he said, gesturing to the chair Logan had vacated for her. With one last skeptical sweep around the room, she sat down in the comfortable armchair, arms crossed over her chest.

When she was settled, Xavier leaned forward and rested his elbows on the desk, his finger tips pressing together just below his lips. "How do you feel about taking over teaching some lessons here at the Institute?"

"Ah, well... what?!" She looked again at the faces around the room. None of the others seemed to show any sign that they had previously known of Xavier's intentions. Storm and Beast glanced at the Professor, each other, and then back to Rogue. Logan just studied at Rogue for a moment, giving a gruff "hmm" in response to the situation.

Xavier smiled again. "You see Rogue, this semester Jean and Scott have asked for more time to focus on their school work, and it presents a perfect opportunity for you. You are ahead in your own classes and have a light schedule in your final semester."

"Maybe Ah have the time, but why meh? Why not Kitty or Kurt? They've been here longer. And they lahke people more."

"Kitty and Kurt may have been members of the Institute longer that you Rogue, but you are older and more mature than both of them. And you have shown a natural talent for leadership. Think of this as the next step in your training in that area."

"Leadership?"

"It's true kid," Logan said, "People listen to you. You usually keep your cool under pressure, stick to the missions, watch out for the others."

"What about Scott?" she said, glancing around as if she half expect the team leader to be hiding in some corner.

"Scott will continue to lead the team, I'm only asking that you consider assisting in the training of some of the newer students," Xavier said. "But as more of the new recruits are reaching a level where they might join the X-Men, we have been considered splitting the team in two at some point. You would be my first choice as a leader of the second team of X-Men," he admitted.

Rogue stood and walked to the window. The mall bound students that Logan had watched earlier had been replaced by several other students enjoying the morning. Jamie and Rahne were enjoying a game of Frisbee, the shape changing mutant snagging the disc in her wolf form and taking off, darting in and out of the six Jamies chasing her. She could see Roberto and Ray playing what appeared to be a very competitive one on one basketball game on the court that just barely peaked out from the corner of the mansion. And off to her right, underneath a tree with Sam, was Remy. Each young men held a six string guitar and Remy looked to be showing the farmboy a particular cord. Rogue smiled a bit at this, until Gambit glanced right up at the window and smiled back at her. When he tipped the neck of his guitar in salute to her, she saw familiar pattern on the strap and recognized the guitar as hers. The smile she wore turned into a glare, and she moved away from the window.

Seeing everyone looking at her in anticipation drove thoughts of thieving Cajuns from her mind. Instead she found herself flooded with insecurities and doubts. Could she handle that much responsibility? Did she want to? Could she tolerate teaching? Would she become more like Scott and Jean and forget to have fun? "Ah, Ah really don't know if Ah'm ready for something lahke this," she said at last in a voice far meeker than she had intended to use.

"Relax darlin'," Logan said, coming to stand beside her and patting her on the back. "You'll do fine."

"Remember child, you don't have to do this if you don't want. But know that you have a great deal of experience to share with the other students," Ororo said with a reassuring smile.

"I have to agree with the others," Hank said. "I think this an excellent idea."

"Ah can't even control mah own powers, how am Ah supposed to help with theirs?"

"Most of the students here have decent grasp of their abilities," Xavier said. "So I would expect you to focus on other aspects of being an X-Man. The same qualities that make you suited for a leader role are those I hope you will instill on those you teach: teamwork, tactics, even your martial arts prowess is something to be passed along. We of course will help you determine what would be best to teach, you would not be alone in this."

"Some things they'd learn better coming from one of their own than me," Logan said.

"Or even Scott and Jean, who have always been seen as, or near enough as, authority figures by some of the new recruits," Ororo added.

Rogue threw her arms in the air, her long bangs shaking as she pulled her head back in exasperation. "Fahne, Ah'll do it! But if they pull any of the crap they did with Scott and Jean, Ah won't be held responsible for what Ah do them."

Logan chuckled. "I hope they do try something, best they learn the hard way."

"So who exactly do ya'll have in mind for mah little classes anyways?"

"Well," Xavier started, "that's something we need to discuss."

-------------

For Scott Summers, the past months had been far more eventful than it had been for some of the others at the mansion. For starters, he upped the focus on training, both for himself and for his team. Jean continually pointed out to him, with increasingly painful finger and elbow pokes, the loss at the Vault did not rest solely on his shoulders, and in many ways was no fault of theirs. He eventually conceded this point, accepting that the Brotherhood was far better trained and prepared then they had ever been before, even if had been once again the Scarlet Witch who had taken out the majority of the X-Men on her own. But that still didn't change the fact they needed more training, and so he poured his whole heart into his Danger Room sessions and various other exercises Logan put them through.

Well, not his whole heart. The last three months had seen a great deal of growth in his relationship with Jean. Being friends for so long had certainly given them a strong foundation to start their relationship on, and the psychic link that had formed between them over the years gave them an intuition into one another that was unlike anything either of them had experienced before in a relationship. Both of those things made it so there was little they didn't know about each other.

That didn't mean there wasn't difficulty, or awkwardness. Christmas had shown that, as Scott joined Jean for the traditional Grey family celebration. He had met her parents several times before, but the holiday had been his first time as anything other than "my friend Scott." Magneto's disruption of Graduation had in a twisted way saved Scott from that experience the first time it might have occurred. He of course had "The Talk" with Dr. Grey, who was immediately weary of him the moment he had triumphantly passed out of the friend zone with Jean. Scott passed with flying colors, mostly on account of Mrs. Grey reminding her husband how much Scott had helped Jean when she had lost control of her powers. After that conversation ended, Scott felt much more comfortable and enjoyed the trip immensely, although he still felt awkward every time he showed any physical affection towards his girlfriend.

The last few months had also reminded Scott that having a little brother around constantly was annoying, a memory that he had blocked out after he thought Alex had died, and continued to forget when they lived on opposite sides of the world. Now that his brother was at the mansion, he found lots of little things about his him that got on his nerves. His brother's nonchalant attitude towards training was one thing; the way he would tell Scott he would honestly try better and then go back to the same thing as before was worse. Jean was always pointing out that Scott was just a little jealous of his brother's carefree attitude while he himself remained the serious leader. It was an answer he accepted. He loved his brother and outside of X-Men related activities he didn't mind the surfer's laid back outlook on life, but he still couldn't help but wish that Alex was just a little more like him. And that he would stop making such a scene every time he found Scott and Jean kissing in a public area of the mansion.

All in all, life was good. He had a beautiful girlfriend, a brother fully back in his life, a feeling that his team was stronger than ever, and he was surrounded by good friends.

Now, if he could only get all his homework done.

Scott was sitting in mansion's library, attempting to work out a math problem from his calculus book. He and Jean were in their second semester at the local State college. While Jean was already on her way in a pre-med program, Scott found himself unsure of what direction he wanted to go. He had decided simply to finish his general education courses first, and worry about degrees later.

He sighed in frustration at the complicated equation and closed his eyes. He carefully pulled his glasses off and massaged his closed eyeballs with his other hand. He thought about going to the bathroom and splashing some water on his face, but decided to give it one more shot before resorting to that. He slipped the glasses carefully back on, ran his fingertips along the edges to ensure they were on tight, and then opened his eyes. He felt the familiar heat in front of his face as the ruby quartz lenses absorbed the kinetic energy unleashed every moment his eyes were open. He was always a little amazed at how his optic beams, which were not heat vision in any way, could create the warmth caused by the interaction with the crystal glasses.

His thoughts of math and mutant power physics were distracted by the sight across the table. Jean was intently reading her biology book, her head resting in one propped up hand, her flame red hair flowing over her arm and just barely touching the wooden tabletop. Her other hand held a pen, the top of which she was slowly dismantling with her teeth. Scott couldn't help but smile as he saw that despite passing back and forth rapidly over the page, her eyes were glazed over.

Without looking up she grinned. "I like it when you smile for no apparent reason."

"There's always a reason," he said with a small laugh. "Usually it's you."

She laughed as well. "I know, but I still like it when they're out of no where." She pulled her head off of her arm, set the pen down, and gave a long yawn as she stretched her arms over her head. Her lithe body arched forward, and Scott couldn't help but smile again, his mind taking in the view and wandering off. Jean froze in mid stretch, partly opening her eyes to look directly at him, one eyebrow arched with a crooked smile on her face.

"No way to be subtle with you huh?" he said with a twinge of guilt.

"Nope, and you know it," she said with a flash of teeth as she put her arms down. "Ugh, maybe we should have gone to the mall with the others, we're not getting anywhere with this homework."

"How about a break?" Scott suggested. "Let's go out and grab some lunch, unwind a bit."

"And I thought I was the mind reader," she said as they both stood. He moved around the table and took her hand, pulling her into his arms and more importantly his lips. She closed her eyes and melted into it, both of them enjoying the physical sensations as well as the feelings of love passing through their ever growing psychic bond in the peaceful moment.

Like all peaceful moments in the lives of the X-Men, it was interrupted, this time by a loud clearing of someone's throat. The two young adults pulled their lips apart, but remained in each other's arms as they both turned to look at the doorway to the library.

Rogue was standing in the center of the frame, arms across her chest and scowl on her face. "Hate ta interrupt what was bound ta be a good show, but which one of ya'll put it in the Professor's head ta ask meh ta teach classes?"

They looked back at each other, Scott eventually pulling away from Jean and moving towards the other girl. "Listen Rogue, he already was thinking about you when I suggested—"

"But ya said mah name," she shook her head. "Did ya tell him who should be in mah class too?"

"I," he winced a bit, in full preparation of the outcome, "might have agreed with a few people he threw out there."

She didn't scream at him, like he expected. Instead she remained standing there in the doorway like a dark force intent on glaring every omission of guilt out of him. Finally she uncrossed her arms and pointed a single finger at Scott, the angel of death marking her next victim. "You'll pay for this Summers. Ah don't know how yet, but you'll get what's comin' ta ya."

"You could have told the Professor you wouldn't do it," Jean pointed out.

Rogue turned her head to Jean and let out a short, humorless laugh. "Yeah, an' when was the last tahme you were able ta say no ta him?" She turned her attention back to Scott. "Soon," was all she said, jabbing her finger forward in emphasis as she stepped backwards through the door and walked down the hall out of sight.

Scott stood there for a moment, contemplating what just happened before turning his head back to Jean. "You... don't think she's serious, do you?"

Jean walked up behind him, resting her hands on one of his shoulders and kissing his cheek softly. "Honey, she's always serious."

Scott looked back at the now empty doorway and could feel the ominous shadow still hanging in the goth's wake.

"Damn."

-------------

Kitty grabbed Bobby's soda and took a sip. "And then all he did was sulk for a week, all because I flirted a little," she said, finishing her story with a smile at Bobby. After watching a matinée showing of the latest travesty Hollywood called comedy, the teens had gone their separate ways, some of them coming together in the food court later that afternoon.

"A little?" he exclaimed. "Try constantly."

Amanda laughed. "Wow, who would have thought New York could be so exciting. Way more exciting than that stupid trip with my parents. You have to take me to sometime Kurt."

"Sure, except zhe sewers are murder on my fur," he said with a grin. "Fuzzy Dude becomes Sticky and Stinky Dude."

"I am just surprised that the Spider-Man is real," Piotr said. It had taken some time, but he was beginning to feel comfortable with the other students. Their constant reassurances and friendliness had helped reduce the shame he felt for his actions when he was working for Magneto.

"So he's not a mutant and he's our age?" Alex asked. He too was adjusting well to life in Bayville, although everyone was a bit tired of his constant complaints about snow and the lack of surf.

"Yeah, he's our age," Bobby answered. "And he was bitten by a radioactive spider or something, and it rewrote his DNA. The guy is smart, used a bunch of science terms even Kitty didn't know."

"I knew them, just never heard them in the context that he was using them," Kitty defended herself.

"How does a spider get radioactive?" Dani asked.

"Chernobyl," Piotr answered.

"I don't think a spider went to Chernobyl and then hitched a ride to New York just to bite this guy," Bobby said. "Though considering what a pain he is..."

"Be nice! It was some science demonstration at ESU, there was an accident, and he was bit," Kitty said.

"Hey Laura," Dani interrupted Kitty someone else came up to their tables. "I thought Tabby and Amara dragged you off,"

Laura Logan had just arrived with a bowl of ice cream in hand, pulling over a chair from another table and sitting down.

"Ditched them," she said, taking another bite of ice cream. "I don't know why they think I want to shop with them. Who cares if there's a sale on shoes?"

Like Piotr, the last three months had seen Laura adapt and open up more to those around her. At the constant urging by every adult in the mansion, she had begun to spend more of her free time with the others. While most of them got on her nerves from time to time (and some far more than others, such as Ray, who gave her constant attention she didn't want), she had experienced quite a lot during her newfound "normal" life that she enjoyed. She was still a loner like her father, and absolutely refused to "throw on a dress, wear some make up, shake that ass and watch the men drool!" as Tabitha had put it, but for the first time she had friends, was living life rather than training and waiting for the next mission, and was not bitter that she hadn't had this life before. Well, she was bitter, but she was learning to enjoy life in the moment, as the Professor had suggested to her during one of their sessions. Laura Logan had come a long way from the girl who had escaped a terrorist organization that had created her as a weapon. Even smaller changes such as changing her code name to Wildthing, having discovered most of the so-called new mutants were calling her by that name anyways, was a huge step for her away from Hydra's X23.

"Shoe sale?" Kitty looked at Amanda and Dani, eyes gleaming.

"I know, but we said we'd be good today for the boys," Amanda said, her voice dejected. She turned to Kurt and gave him a few pokes in the ribs. "Speaking of which, mine never got me that ice cream he said he would."

"Okay! I get zhe point, stop poking! Let's go already," his voice was angry, but he was smiling and put his arm around her shoulders as they walked towards the Dairy Queen.

"Stupid boyfriends," Kitty muttered, watching them go with a smile.

"What was that?" Bobby asked.

"Nothing!" Kitty said quickly, kissing him before he could say anything else.

"You know, it's getting kinda gross watching those two make out all the time," Dani said, crossing her arms and sneaking a glance at Alex.

"Back home such displays of affection were rare. I find it refreshing for people to be able to express oneself so openly," Piotr said.

"They do seem to do it a lot," Laura agreed with Dani, tilting her head slightly as she watched them. She still didn't quite understand the appeal to kissing, holding hands or anything else the couples she observed did with one another. She knew part of it was her lack of experience, and also thought Hydra's attempt to control her emotions was another piece to it.

"So much better than walking into the kitchen and seeing your brother go at it with his girlfriend," Alex's face twisted like there was a bad taste in his mouth. "That's totally the last thing I need to see when going through wave withdrawal."

"Yeah, that can't be fun. But you know, you really should take up another hobby since you can't surf. You'll be as stressed as Scott if you don't," Dani said.

"Ah man, that's the last thing I want! I'm freaking out just thinking about it. Quick Dani, save me. What can I do oh wise one, to save myself from a fate worse than death?" Alex asked, grabbing her hands and holding on for dear life.

She let out a giggle at his antics. "Hmmm, well...you could take up, um, oh! How about rock climbing, there's some great spots up by my Grandfather's place."

"Yeah, okay, that could be fun."

"Cool."

Meanwhile, Kitty and Bobby broke their kiss, though had stayed mostly in their own world. "I think they were talking about us again," Kitty said softly to Bobby, grinning.

"Let 'em, if they have nothing better to do," Bobby smiled back.

Kitty glanced over at her best friend. Noticing her hands and the looks she and Alex were sharing, she motioned to Dani with a waver of her arm and with a twinkle of mischief in her sapphire eyes. "Hey Dani, I need to go to the bathroom, go with me?"

"Huh? Oh, sure!" Dani said, reading Kitty's intent. "Want to come Laura?"

The clone shook her head. "I don't have to go."

"Alright, suit yourself." The two girls crossed the food court together and headed towards the restroom, their heads pressed together in quiet chatter.

Laura watched them leave. "Why must they always go together?"

"It is safer to travel in numbers," Piotr offered.

"Nah, they're just going to gossip about Alex," Bobby said.

"What? No way dude," the blond said.

"Come on, you and Dani are on the way to being the next hot couple at the mansion. Don't deny it either, or do you suddenly like the idea of climbing anything other than a wave?"

"Okay, it's probably going to happen," Alex said with a relaxed grin, leaning back into his chair and running a hand through his hair. "She's a cool chick, I totally dig the whole in one with nature thing she has going on, very Zen. What about you Piotr, eyes on anyone?"

The big man's face blushed slightly. "I am happy enjoying being in America without the need to do Magneto's bidding. I will let romance fall as it may."

"You are all able to talk about these things in front of everyone," Laura said, still grasping to understand the Female Rule of Two. "Why do they feel the need to run off like that? Why not just say it in front of everyone?"

"Not everyone can speak exactly what's on their minds like you do," Bobby pointed out to her.

"I don't say everything that's on my mind," she said curtly.

"You do have a tendency to speak without filtering anything out," Alex said. "Not that there's anything wrong with that."

"I filter out a lot," Laura said, her eyebrows coming together in the slightest way as frustration at not being believed began to rise up in her.

"Vhat do you not say out loud?" Kurt picked up the conversation as he and Amanda came back with their ice cream.

"Um," she thought for a moment. "I think about easiest exits out of rooms, various items that could be used weapons effectively, who should to be eliminated first, you by the way," she said offhandedly to Piotr, "quickest ways to subdue opponents, things like that."

"Well," Bobby said after a moment. "That was kinda creepy."

Laura shrugged. "Just training, I'm used to ignoring the instincts."

Amanda looked to her boyfriend. "Why do you always ask the stupid questions?"

"My adorable inquisitive nature?" he said, trying to play the innocent.

Kitty and Dani came back at this time, the two finish a laugh begun out of earshot of the rest of them. When they reached the awkward near silence of the others, they both stopped. "What happened?" Dani asked.

"Not much, Laura was just telling us how she's been trained to think about the best ways to take out everyone she's around."

"Oh!" Kitty said in surprise. "That's a real bummer." Fearing that it might have come out in a way she didn't intended it to, the phasing mutant walked behind the girl and gave her a hug. Laura tensed for a moment at the invasion of her personal space, then allowed herself to relax in the embrace.

"It's alright," Kitty was saying to her. "The way Logan trains us sometimes, it's a wonder we all aren't thinking like that all the time."

"Time!" Amanda cried, grabbing Kurt's wrist and looking at his holowatch. "Ugh, it's almost five. I need to be home for dinner," she said with a pout as she let go of his hand. "Don't want Mom and Dad thinking I'm hanging out with the mutants."

"Vhen are you going to tell zhem you are still dating one?" Kurt asked quietly.

"When I'm eighteen," she said with a smile, hoping to move the conversation away from the one main sore spot in their relationship.

It wasn't that Amanda's parents were racist. As a black couple in America who had to work hard to be as well off as they were, they understood racism and bigotry perfectly well and adamantly denied having any such feelings about mutants. But their experience with the outcast group, both in what the news had shown in the wake of the mutant's exposure to the world and Apocalypse, as well as two mutants destroying the inside of their home left them very wary of mutants, especially Kurt. To him, the Seftons seemed to take old stance of being perfectly fine with mutants, unless one was dating their daughter.

The group stood and began to head to for the exit, hoping they'd meet up with Tabby and Amara so they wouldn't have to go looking for them. Kurt and Amanda kept talking quietly to themselves at the group's conversation turned to school issues.

"We've been dating for almost a year in secret; I just don't like sneaking around like zhis."

"I know sweetie, and believe me I would love to have things be different, but I don't want them to make things any harder than they already are for us."

"I find it hard to believe zhey don't suspect anyzhing as it is."

She stopped and took Kurt's hands. "You really want to try this, don't you? Letting them know we're still together? They're going to freak."

Kurt looked down at the ground behind Amanda for a moment before bringing his gaze back into her eyes. "I love you, zhey need to realize zhat."

It was Amanda's turn to look away in thought. Finally she smiled and kissed him. "You know I love you too. If you really want to risk it, then we'll do everything we can to make this work. We'll make them see."

They shared another kiss before linking arms and continued to the mall exit to catch up with the others. When they found them, they were in the back of a crowd of people gathered by the glass doors.

"What is going on?" Kurt asked.

"Not sure," Bobby answered, trying to peer over the crowd.

Piotr, who stood at least a foot taller than most of the crowd, squinted his eyes and tried to see what was occurring out in the dim of the evening. "It looks like the police are apprehending a criminal."

"Cops are chasing some mutie," said one of the guys near the back of the crowd. "He stole a bunch of stuff from some store."

The students pushed their way through and saw outside a group of police heading toward a hunched over figure grasping a bag. The voices of the officers were muffled by the closed glass of the mall doors, but they could hear them yelling to the figure to stay down. Several approached slowly, hands on their guns. Suddenly the figure threw its right arm out and a volley of something smoldering red shot out at the cops. They fell to the ground, many grasping at their shins while others attempted to avoid any more fire. The figure lept to his feet and took off running, diving into a nearby open manhole.

"Vas that?" Kurt asked quietly.

Kitty looked back at him. "Evan?"


	3. Chapter 3

**3**

The mutants looked at each other in astonishment. While it was not completely unheard of for Evan or one of the other Morlocks to come to the surface, thievery was not their usual method. Even last year when Evan had attempted to make a stand against the bigotry of Bayville, he always paid for any goods he bought in stores. This new apparent direction into crime was unexpected.

"What the hell does he think he's doing?" Bobby whispered to Kitty as they attempted to push their way back through the crowd of people. They would have to use another exit to the mall and it was probably best that they left before someone—

Someone grabbed Bobby's shoulder and pulled him back as Kitty kept moving forward. "Hey, I recognize you, you're one of the muties from that freaky school!" exclaimed a man who had a hold on Bobby's shoulder.

"Oh my God!" screamed a woman, grabbing hold of her small child who buried his head in his mother's lap.

"Why don't you just get out of here and leave us alone?" the man holding Bobby said.

"That's what I was trying to do before you grabbed me." Bobby said, shrugging the man's hand off of him.

"Yeah, sure you were," someone else said. "Probably leaving with the rest of the loot."

"What? I was standing here with the rest of you!" Bobby exclaimed.

"Listen, why don't we all just calm down, he had nothing to do with this," Kitty pushed her was back through the crowd and stood in front of Bobby. "No point in getting excited over nothing."

"How about you listen freak," said the first man, jabbing his finger towards her face. "You mutants have caused enough problems for us in this town. If you're not fighting in the streets, you're defending your buddies when they break the law." Behind him, much of the crowd nodded in agreement. "I'm getting a little sick and tired of hearing about you hurting innocent people and ruining everything for the rest of us who just want to live a nice quiet life without worrying about a bunch of monsters like you destroying our way of life."

The other mutants had gathered in close around Bobby and Kitty, while Piotr stepped between the two and the crowd. His voice was calm, but his size and harsh eyes intimidated more than a few of the humans. "I suggest you all leave. We do not wish any trouble and merely wish to go home after a long day, as I am sure many of you want to."

Some of the humans, those who had mostly gathered to see what the commotion was about, began to break from the potential mob before there was too much trouble. Others towards the back gathered in closer to fill in the emptying spots. The initial spokesman attempted to stare the Russian boy down. It was not an easy feet, as even outside of his metal form Piotr was just under seven feet tall and the other man was a good foot shorter.

"Well isn't that just convenient? Your friend steals from us and gets into a shootout with our cops, and all you want to do is go home and walk away with the rest of things you've stolen from our mall. We should burn down that mansion of your's, stop you from making your army, lock you all up and then put you down like the animals you are!"

"I'm sorry you feel that way about us, but I assure you we did—"

Piotr was cut off by a boot clad foot crashing into the chest of the man he was speaking to. Laura let herself follow through all the way to the tiled floor with the kick, one knee pinning the man to the ground across his chest and throat, the other stretched out behind her for leverage. He stated to try to push the small girl off of him, but two things stopped him. First, she was far heavier than a girl her size should have been, and second there were two adamantium claws pointed at his face, their sharp tips less than an inch from each eye. Laura's other arm was outstretched, the claws of that hand unsheathed at the crowd as a warning to any who would interfere.

"You're not going to do anything to us," she said, her face in a snarl. "You're not going to lock us up and you're not going to bother us again. You're going to realize that if we wanted to hurt you we would have done it a long time ago, and that if you see us again, you're going to leave us alone. Understand me?"

"Yeah, I understand," choked out the man. His voice was not filled but fear but rather contempt and hatred.

"Laura!" a voice broke through to her. She cocked her head back and saw Kitty staring at her with wide eyes. With one last glare at the bigot beneath her, she sheathed her claws with a "snikt!" and pushed off his chest with her knee. She walked back to her friends, feeling the eyes of everyone on her as did so.

One of the braver humans, a friend of their fallen leader by the looks of it, helped the other man to his feet. The man wiped his face quickly, trying to shake the feeling of the two blades so close to his eyeballs. "This isn't over," he said, pointing a long arch at all of the mutants gathered before him. Running his hand over his face again and grasping his chest in pain, he shoved his way through the crowd, which began to disperse quickly to get away from the mutants.

"It's never over, is it?" Bobby said bitterly.

"At least no one was hurt," Kitty offered.

"Yeah, doubt they'll let us back in here now though," he concluded.

"I'm sorry," Laura said, her deep brown eyes staring at Bobby. "What he said, I couldn't—" she trailed off.

Bobby gave her a half hearted smile. "Don't worry about it Wildthing. I was about two seconds away from doing something crazy myself."

"Ve should get going, Amanda needs to get home, and zhe Professor vill vant to know about Evan," Kurt said in a soft voice, a mix of the voice of reason and shock at what just happened.

"Sounds like a plan. Someone call Tabby and Amara up, let's go home," Bobby said, wrapping an arm protectively around Kitty's waist as they turned for the doors again.

-------------

"This is the third reported attack in the United States by mutants in the last month, and as with the previous attacks across the country, the perpetrator fled into the sewer system. Bystanders were shocked by the violent nature of the mutant."

A frail, horse faced woman was shown on the screen holding a small child. "I've always been fine with mutants as long as they kept to themselves. But this, I can't believe this. It makes me think everything they're saying about mutants being dangerous is right."

The broadcast returned to the man sitting behind the news desk. "Police have not released information at this time as to what items were stolen during the raid. Bayville's Mayor Henry Wilkins reassured the city's citizens this evening in a statement, saying that 'the police and other law enforcement agencies will do whatever is necessary to find and capture the mutants terrorizing our streets and places of business.'"

"In technology news, Tony Stark is again---"

Professor Xavier pressed a button on the table in front of him, and the War Room screens changed from the live television feed back to Cerebro data readouts. He turned his chair to face the gathered X-Men and select New Mutants. Along with the regular X-Men and those that were at the mall, the group also included Logan, Ororo, Hank and Ray, due to his connection with the Morlocks. "Thankfully your encounter with the crowds afterwards was not reported." Xavier began. "And you are sure this was Evan?" he asked Kitty and Kurt.

"It vas hard to tell, but it looked like him."

"We need to stop him before he gets himself killed," Scott said. "Not to mention things are even worse than they were the last time he starting causing problems. That mob was a lot bolder than usual."

"Fear leads to anger," Bobby smirked.

"It does appear that their fear is leading them to be more aggressive and reckless when it comes to their actions," Hank said. "The situation is escalating far worse than we anticipated Charles."

"Agreed. We can't afford to have these incidents continue to agitate the human population. Every step we take forward is compromised with continued mutant/human confrontation. However, I believe these ventures to the surface by Evan could also be symptoms of a larger problem."

"You don't think Magneto?" asked Jean.

"No. While I would be surprised if Magneto had not reached out to the Morlocks, Erik has always had a taste for the dramatics with his attacks. This seems, frankly, too desperate and petty for him. In all our dealings with the Morlocks, they have only moved actively on the surface in reaction to problems they were facing below. While Evan has always been headstrong, after his run in with Duncan Mathews last year he seemed content with a more defensive stance rather than aggressive. This change in attitude again has me worried. We need more information. Scott, I want you to take a small team into the Morlock tunnels tomorrow. Yourself, Jean, and Ororo. Ray, I would like you to go with them as well, seeing as Callisto seems to trust you slightly more than she trusts anyone from the surface."

"You realize every time we go down there she trusts me less," Ray spoke up.

"I know, but it is a necessary trip. Hopefully our small contingency will not alarm them. Find out why Evan feels the need to come above ground after all this time, and if there is any way we can help."

"What about the rest of us?" Bobby asked.

"For now, remain on your guard. Until we know exactly what the situation is, I don't want to risk causing another incident. Everyone should be busy with school and normal training this week, but I would like everyone to return to the mansion as soon as possible after school tomorrow. Let's keep our time off the grounds to a minimum. That's all for now, we'll discuss this more as soon as we have more information."

The students filed out of the room, some heading off to finish up some last minute homework, others like Kurt, Bobby, Ray and Alex hoping to get a few more hours in down in the game room on their Justice League Legends game before they had to get some sleep. Laura was to be the last one out before Xavier spoke up again.

"Laura, if you could stay a moment."

She froze in the doorway, her eyes closed for a moment before turning to face the Professor. Logan was also still in the room, leaning against the same console bank he had been leaning on the whole meeting. His arms were crossed over his chest, his eyes down on the floor but his ears turned towards the conversation.

"Have a seat Laura," Xavier gestured and the girl complied. "For how long today would you estimate you lost control?"

"A few seconds," she admitted, "by the time I had it back my claws were out, I decided to just go with it to intimidate him."

"I see," he paused for a moment, allowing silence to hang in the room as he gathered his thoughts. "Laura, I want you to describe your feelings from your time at the mall, both before and after you attacked the man."

It was a common line of questioning between the two. In their sessions together, the Professor often asked Laura to describe any emotions she had experienced during the day, or in a particular situation. Hydra had attempted several different processes to suppress the emotions and free will of Laura both through the cloning process and when she was a child, the end result being emotional instability and plenty of rage. Xavier hoped that exposing Laura to a more balanced life and the emotional range that went with it would help ease her damaged psyche. For the most part it worked, and discussing the new feelings she encountered or analyzing when her limitless anger took over often helped control it.

She thought for a moment then began. "I was annoyed a lot, with Tabby and Amara. Not angry, just annoyed they kept dragging me around. I didn't get the movie, it made no sense to me. I found the others in the food court, I ate ice cream." She smiled. Her smile was not a grin, more of a smirk with only the slightest hint of teeth, but its rarity was decreasing as time went on. "I was confused a lot, I got frustrated a little when everyone didn't believe something I said. But I was having fun being with them. I was, um," her brow furled in concentration, trying to remember exactly what she was told the feeling was called. "The one where I wasn't really happy, but I was okay?"

"Content?" Xavier supplied.

"Yeah, content. Then we had to go and there was the crowd and the man was talking about locking people up and burning the mansion. I was angry at him. He wanted to take everything away and I wanted to stop him. Then, the red, but I didn't hurt him, I managed to stop. But it scared him so decided to use that."

"What made you angry about what he said?"

"It's just," she struggled to find the words. Xavier knew she didn't have a problem being frank, but sometimes describing the new sensations she was experiencing was difficult for her. "I've only been really happy here and with everyone here. This whole place used to make me angry, when I came here looking for Logan, but now I'm a part of it and I don't want to lose that. Even in the woods I was... lonely. I'm not lonely here."

Xavier gave her a smile. "Thank you Laura. I'm touched to know our efforts to make you feel accepted have succeeded. We still have a lot of work in controlling your temper, but the restraint you showed today is commendable and a sign of great progress. That's all for now, I'll see you tomorrow for our regular session."

Laura stood, glancing at Logan who looked up himself and gave her small smile. She returned it and left the War Room through the sliding doors. When they closed fully behind her, she could still hear with her acute ears Logan talking to the Professor.

"Thanks for going easy on her Charles."

"It may cause problems for us in the future, but as only the man's pride was injured, I don't see much reason to dwell on it now."

She could hear Logan chuckle. "Hell Charles, the way they told it I probably would have done the same thing."

Laura felt her lips turn up into another smile, and she left door behind her.

-------------

After school the next day, as Scott and his team took the X-Van into the city, Rogue was checking her uniform one last time, securing her chest plate, running her fingers across her utility belt and tucking her throwing stars into their belt pouch before pulling her brown leather gloves on. She leaned against the sink, her eyes moving up to stare at themselves in the mirror in front of her, searching out the fear she could see there and forcing it back down. This was going to be more annoying than terrifying, she thought to herself. Letting out a sigh she pushed off the sink and left the lower level locker room.

She walked briskly down the long metal corridor, subconsciously giving her gloves another tug before she strode into the Danger Room and surveyed the crowd around her. Ten mutants had shown up for her first lesson and were mingling around the room, most wearing the standard New Mutant uniform, though some attempted to customize their drab wardrobe as much as possible. Alex wore his without gloves, as his powers tended to shred them after a single blast. He sat with Dani, Amara and Tabby. Dani had added a slim headband with two eagle feathers dangling from one side by a piece of rawhide to her uniform while Amara kept hers plain and unadorned. Tabby, as always, wore her Siren's uniform, sunglasses tucked up on her head. Near them Jamie and Rahne stayed in regulation, talking to each other about a project at school they had partnered up for. Sam and Roberto were joking with each other in the center of the room, while off to one side Piotr and Laura were speaking quietly together.

Rogue almost laughed at how identical the two looked. They both wore similar uniforms; tight black pants tucked into heavy boots, standard issue Xavier utility belts, and sleeveless black tops that clung to their bodies. Piotr's arms were completely bare while Laura wore a pair of black gloves that ran partway up her forearms, similar to the ones Logan used to wear, modified to allow for two instead of three claws. But the similarities between the short girl and tall boy didn't end in wardrobe. They were discussing the cartoons they both had fallen in love with since coming to the mansion, both clearly excited by them, but their stoic natures allowing for only slight hand movements, small smiles and short laughs. Rogue was pretty sure the girl had a crush on the big Russian, and from the conversations she had with the young clone knew she had no clue what her feelings and hormones were telling her. Rogue was just happy to see that Laura and Piotr would be friends no matter what happened with Wildthing's emotional confusion, having bonding over the alien nature of this new environment for each of them. And everyone had become friends with the soft spoken Piotr, who was so friendly that most people had to think hard to remember that they had once been enemies.

Overall Rogue was happy with the group and anticipated a good first class. Only two no shows, and one of them, Ray, had been excused due to his mission in the Morlock tunnels. The other, well, Rogue didn't mind too much. She stood in the doorway a moment longer, attempting to get a feel as to how today would go. For the most part everyone was in good spirits and fairly relaxed after a day of Monday classes. No one looked as if they were planning any initiation pranks for their new teacher, though Rogue suspected that was because their ring leader Bobby wasn't in the lesson.

The conversations stopped as she walked to the center of the room. The students came and formed a half circle around her, waiting to see what this new teacher would be like. "All right, Ah know y'all like to harass ya new teacher. Ya did it to Beast and ya did it to Scott an' Jean, though Ah don't blame ya so much for Jean." There was a few laughs at that. "Ya'll were younger then and hopefully ya'll are a little more mature than that now and ya realize what Ah have to say might help ya live if we run into something lahke Apocalypse again. If not, hopefully ya'll are smart enough to realize if ya mess with meh, Ah'll hurt ya bad."

A few of them, namely Alex, Dani and Tabby all gave a laugh, Tabby going as far as shouting, "You tell 'em girl!" However, Roberto and Sam shared a look and Roberto raised his hand.

"Sunspot?"

"Mind if I disable the additions we made to your Danger Room program?"

"That'd be a good idea."

He ran to a panel near the door, restoring the backup he made of Rogue's original program as the laughing trio were joined by Jamie and Rahne. Piotr gave her his gentle smile while Laura presented what was becoming known as her amused smirk.

Roberto rejoined the group, brushing off the elbow Tabitha jabbed into his ribs, and Rogue continued her opening remarks. "Now besides just bein' one more person to help teach the lot of ya, the Professor thinks Ah can teach you some things the others can't. Maybe Ah can, maybe Ah can't, but Ah'm gunna try and make sure ya'll are ready for whatever Magneto or whoever else comes along throws at us. Some of ya are more ready than others, but since we all need to work as a team, we all need to train together. So unless ya'll got any questions, let's get—"

She was cut off by the opening of the Danger Room door behind her. She didn't bother to turn around, knowing full well who it was. As much as she tried to hide it she knew she was grimacing in frustration as Remy joined the line of waiting students, flashing a grin at the class and a wink at Rogue. She rolled her eyes at him. He was dressed similarly to Piotr and Laura in a black ensemble, though she couldn't tell if his shirt was sleeveless as he wore his dark brown duster, his hands in tight black leather.

"Nahce of you to join us Swamp Rat."

"Sorry Chere, de mansion's jus' too big an' I keep getting' lost."

"Whatever Remy, let's just get started. Break off into pairs, grab a mat and start stretchin', Ah don't want anyone tearin' anything."

She turned her back on the class as they began chatting again as they broke into pairs and she went to go check on the obstacle course program she had set up the night before, ensuring all of Roberto's surprises were gone when she heard a cough behind her. "'Scuse me Miss Rogue, but Remy don' have a partner, dey all taken."

Rogue spun around and looked. Sure enough, with Ray gone the class had an odd number of people, and there was Remy with a huge grin on his face. She knew immediately that this was a scheme of his, as any normal day would have found Amara and Tabby all over him. But the girls had partnered with Roberto and Sam, probably at Remy's insistence. She thought about just telling him to go and stretch by himself, but decided to just do it in hopes that he might leave her alone the rest of the class. She knew he wouldn't though.

She tried to ignore the part of her that looked forward to his antics to impress her or get close to her, the part currently getting butterflies at his disarming smile.

"Fahne, move over here," she pulled him to an empty mat someone had laid out for them and forced him to sit. He mimicked the others, starting with his legs forward to reach his toes, an easy feat for him. Rogue knelt behind him and held his back down, helping to deepen the stretch.

"It's nice ta see yo' able ta touch me wit'out flinchin' no mo'e," Remy said after a twenty count in the stretch. He spread his legs as wide as he could while still sitting and reached out down in front of him again, Rogue assisting from behind.

"What are ya blabbin' about now?" she said.

"Just dat when I firs' came ta de mansion yo' scared to touch me or anyone else, glove or non. Now yo' got non problem? I t'ink dat a good t'ing."

"Well, don't let this go to ya head, but what ya said was right. After Apocalypse Ah was scared to touch anyone. But ya said Ah had to take what Ah could get, and Ah been trying."

He shifted to stretching over his right, looking up over his shoulder at her. "Good for yo' Chere. I'm jus' happy ta have yo' hands on me."

He sat up and she gave him a hard, stinging slap to his back as he moved over his left leg. "Ah'm trying to be nahce, trying to be serious, maybe even thank ya for talkin' some sense into meh and ya have to be a pig about it." She pushed him down hard. If hadn't already been naturally flexible he would have torn something.

"Sorry Rogue, yo' jus' like no ot'er girl I ever met. Not my fault yo' got mo'e fire den all de ot'ers. Don' get me wrong t'ough, dat a very good t'ing."

She wasn't sure what to say. Like most things he said to her, this conversation was infuriating, endearing and thought provoking all at the same time, and she wanted out before he drew her in more. She stood, leaving him halfway through the stretching routine. "All right, that's enough. Time to start. Computer, activate Rogue Course 001."

The area around them shimmered as it transformed itself into an grassy landscape with a clump of trees to the north. Her confused thoughts sadly did not fade away with the reality of the room, and so she did what she always did when Remy brought on conflicting feelings in her: she turned it into anger at the situation. Staring up into the purple sky where she knew Xavier sat watching from the now obscured control room, she screamed out loud and clear with that anger, venting her frustration at the entire situation at him.

His gentle nudge of reassurance in return did not help her mood.

-------------

The four mutants traveled through the sewers at a slow pace. They were not carrying much in the way of gear, a few flashlights in hand with Scott carrying a backpack with emergency supplies. They did not wear their combat uniforms, instead opting for heavy work khakis and t-shirts, with boots to help get through the muck. Scott did wear his visor instead of his glasses, always prepared for trouble, but mostly trusting the visor to stay on better than his glasses in case he slipped and fell. They were hoping to present themselves as non-aggressive looking as possible to the Morlocks, but the visor was one allowance he was willing to make.

Their slow going was attributed to both the less than ideal footing in the dank tunnels and Ororo, who had stopped several times to center herself.

In general, Ororo disliked when she could not see the sky. As a teenager on the African plains, where the sky stretched out in all directions, she rarely felt trapped. The huts that the villagers built for her always had openings in the roof. Even though her room at Xavier's had a skylight and a balcony, the lower levels always agitated her to a degree. It was not overwhelming or even terribly discomforting, just a gently nagging sensation to leave the room as quickly as possible.

Being in the sewers though, that was driving her mad.

It was thankfully not as bad as she had expected it to be and the labyrinth like tunnels that ran under the city were much wider and taller than what she thought a normal sewer would be. She knew that the claustrophobia she suffered from since she was a small child would be a problem, and a few times she fell out of step with the others to refocus herself. She had to see Evan, she would keep reminding herself. The sensation of the walls closing in on her would subside after some time, her breathing would return to normal, and would press on.

"Are you sure you're all right Storm?" Scott asked as she stopped again.

"Yes, I will be fine. I have been in far tighter spaces than this," she answered. "How much farther Ray?"

"Uh," Ray said, rubbing his neck and looking sheepish. "I don't know?"

"What do you mean you don't know?" Scott said, his voice rising slightly.

"I mean, we're going in the right direction at least. I told you I didn't know exactly where it was. I've only been to their base once and that was over a year and an half ago. Don't worry though, if we get close enough they'll sense us and send someone out."

"Jean, can you sense any of them?"

The redhead closed her eyes and gently held her fingertips to her temples. After a moment her brow creased in increased concentration before her mouth turned into a frown. "No, someone is here but I can't tell if it's them. Something down here is distorting everyone's mental projections."

"Looks like we continue the old fashioned way," Storm said. She pushed herself off the wall she had been leaning up against and they prepared to move on.

Just then there was a shuffling sound behind them. "Four mutants," a voice said from inside the dim. A bone white figure stepped out looking each of them up and down. "From Xavier's."

"Hey Caliban," Ray said, stepping to the front to allow himself to be seen fully. "How have you been?"

"Hello Berserker. Caliban is well," he said slowly. "The others will want to see you." He moved back to the tunnel that he had first come from, calling over his shoulder, "Follow," as he left. With a glance amongst themselves, they did as they were asked.

The tunnels they traveled through were darker and twisted more than the ones they had just left; after a few rapid turns they had quickly lost their way. Finally they came upon a large iron door that Caliban rapped a series of knocks upon. The grating sound of metal scraping on metal echoed off the narrow walls as the door unlocked and swung forward. A Morlock they had not seen before, a muscular man with skin that looked like rock, held the door open for them. They slipped through the portal and the man let go of the door, which slammed back into place behind them.

They were in a well lit round room with several other pathways branching out of it like the one they had just come from, each with a small length of corridor that poured into the main room. The ceiling of this room, while not open to the surface above them, was high and domed. In the center of this hub stood Evan, his form hunched over slightly from the outgrowth of bones that formed around him like a suit of armor. At the far side of the room, leaning against the corner of another tunnel entrance stood Callisto. Caliban and the rock mutant joined her in this entryway.

While the eye patch wearing mutant also wore an emotionless mask towards them, Evan's face broke into a smile when he saw his aunt step forward into the main room. They crossed the distance to each other and embraced in a hug. "Auntie O, it's good to see you," said the nephew as they pulled back. "I was surprised that you came down here, I know you don't like tight spaces. Hope this room is okay for you."

"It's much better than the rest of the trip. Thank you for the consideration," Ororo smiled at him.

"I hope you understand why we don't just go to our camp, we don't like outsiders too much," he said. "I have to say I'm a little surprised to see you guys down here. Are things okay? How's everything at the mansion? Everyone doing okay?"

"What happened at the mall Evan?" Scott said, arms crossed over his chest.

"What are you talking about?" Evan asked with a confused look on his face.

"Last night you were in a shootout with the police outside the mall after you took something. Some of the others saw you. What did you take and why are you stealing things?"

"I don't know what you're talking about man, and you have a lot of nerve coming down here and throwing accusations around."

"Save it Daniels. What's going on?"

Ororo's calming voice interrupted any further badgering from Scott. "Evan, you know you can trust us."

"Medicine, okay?" he said at last. "A couple of kids got sick and I grabbed some medicine. You here to arrest me?"

"If there is a serious medical problem you should have come to us Evan," Ororo said. "Hank is more than capable of treating the Morlocks and our doors are always-"

"It's just a flu," he cut in. "Nothing serious, a bad cold. We're not going to run to Xavier looking for handouts every time someone has a runny nose."

"You'd rather just stir up more problems by stealing things instead," Scott said.

"Maybe this is a dumb question to ask," Ray said, hoping to avoid any sort of shouting match from erupting, "but why did you go Spyke? You're not exactly stealth guy."

"Others were scared to go to the surface. Things are getting bad for mutants up there on the streets, you know, those places you guys avoid on your way to and from school."

"Okay, stop," Jean said, stepping between Scott and Evan. "This isn't getting us anywhere. I know the Morlocks want to be self sufficient, but it would benefit everyone if you swallowed your pride and came to us for help when you needed it instead of aggravating the situation even more. Things are tense enough as it is and it's not going to be long until someone else gets Duncan Matthews's bright idea of bombing the sewers if they start to think there are dangerous mutants down here. And Scott, don't tell me you wouldn't take what you needed to protect your people if you had to."

Scott and Evan stared at each other, a silent battle of wills, each daring the other to say something that might spark Jean's wrath. It was Evan who backed down first. "Look, we have what we need; I don't see any reason for us to go topside again. Don't worry about us. Auntie O, it was good to see you."

"I wish we would see each other more. You said you would visit."

"I know, I'm flakey, I'm sorry. I'll try harder."

"The Professor wanted you to have this," Ororo said, pulling out a small clip of money. "This way you can at least pay for something on your own if you need more medicine."

Evan gave a short laugh. "Because the last time I tried to pay for something at a store worked out so well." He pushed her hand and the money away. "I already said we don't want charity Auntie O. We don't want anything from you or Magneto, we just want to be left alone."

"Magneto was here?" Scott said, his interest immediately picking up.

"We're not important enough for him to come himself. Sent a couple of lackies, didn't recognize them. Told us we could come live on some magic island and be safe. He really set that up?"

"So he says," Jean said. "But it's Magneto."

"Yeah, we didn't trust him either. Anyways, say hi to everyone for me, I promise I'll try and visit you Auntie." The rock mutant walked across the room again, opening the iron door for the Xavier team to leave through. As he slammed the door closed behind them Jean could see the look Callisto gave Evan, her suspicions confirmed.

"They're hiding something," she said after they had moved far enough from the meeting room.

"Yep. Did a pretty bad job of pretending like they weren't too. Did you sense any idea of what?" Scott asked.

"Not much, fleeting feelings. But the fact they had some way of creating enough psychic static to block my powers from being really effective is enough to have me thinking there is a lot more going on than we know. And Callisto gave Evan a look as we were leaving that, I don't know, was like she was worried he gave away too much."

"I saw that too," Ray said. "And every time I've met Callisto she's made it pretty clear she's not one to sit still and be quiet like she did today. Something's up."

"Do you think it's worth poking around a bit?" Scott asked?

"I do not think that would be wise, considering they know where we are and have successfully stopped us from finding their camp," Ororo said. "It is probably best to return and inform the Professor about this. He can decide best how to proceed from here."

-------------

Callisto watched Spyke pace back and forth. "Relax. Jean wasn't able to detect anything with all the noise Whisper was making. We're fine."

"I didn't want the X-Men involved in this, it's our problem," he said, stopping at a table between them which had several items laid out on top of it. He looked through them for what had to be the hundredth time, still lost for answers. He began pacing again in frustration.

"Then you shouldn't have been seen by them at the mall."

"I didn't know any of them were there!" he shouted.

"I know, I know, we've been over it and I shouldn't keep pointing it out. What's done is done. Just keep it down."

He glanced back to the far side of the room and nodded. "Yeah, sorry."

"I hope they don't decide to start poking around down here again. Your cover was enough, but left it too open for them to try and offer help. I don't want to owe Xavier anything because we ran into a problem we thought we couldn't handle."

"I know the man, he wouldn't hold it over us like that."

"Trust me, we ask for his help and when his school gets attacked again, and we both know it will someday soon, he'll be looking to us to help hide his students. And this time he'll lead the humans right to us."

"He'll probably ask for our help either way," Evan said.

"So you want to go run and see if you can catch Cyclops and tell him about our guest?"

"No, of course not. This is a Morlock problem. The Morlocks will deal with it." He had stopped again at the table, picking up a standard issue M-16 rifle and turning it over in his hands. "I would be less worried about this if I knew what he was doing with all this stuff, it's not his style."

"It's the same question we've been asking him and ourselves since we were able to capture him, and we don't have a telepath strong enough to dig into his mind and find out. Doubt even Xavier could get all the answers out of him. Let's just be thankful he didn't hurt the kids more than he did and that the medicine you got is working to stop the infection they started to get."

"It's my fault Jack and Katie got hurt. I'm the one with the training, I should have been there to take him down and protect everyone."

"Everyone needs to sleep and he caught us by surprise, stop beating yourself up over it."

Evan stuffed the various guns and clothing back into the bag their captive was carrying and handed it back to Callisto. "Better not keep any of that near here. He brought it for a reason and if he gets out I don't want him getting hold of it."

"He's not getting out of there," she nodded to the thick door set into one of the walls.

"Rather be safe than sorry," Evan said. Just then there was a banging on the door, not someone trying to break out but someone knocking their fist against it to get their attention. "I'll handle this, maybe he's got something important to say."

"Doubt it," Callisto said.

"You never know, he might let something slip." Evan walked to the door and opened a small panel on the upper half of the door. It revealed a small eyeslot with thick iron bars too close together to reach a hand through but wide enough to look into the dank, makeshift cell.

A tall shadow on the other side moved its head down to stare through the bars with feral black eyes. "You idiots realize I can hear everything you're sayin', right?"

"Why tell us that then? Why not use that to your advantage?" Evan asked.

"What do you sewer trash have to say that I actually give a damn about?" he said with a snarl.

Evan shook his head. "You've got a lot of nerve talking smack Sabretooth when we've got you locked up tight."

"Who says you have me locked up? Maybe I'm just hanging out here because I've got nothing better to do right now."

"Yeah, I'm sure you don't. What does Magneto want with us?"

"Who says I'm working for Magneto these days? Maybe I just like toying with you."

"Why the guns? Why the uniforms?"

"Trophies," Sabretooth said with a toothy grin. "Came here on my way back from another hunt."

"Whatever. You just sit in there for a while until you decide you want to tell us something useful."

Evan moved to close the small panel when Sabretooth began speaking again. "Tell you what I am going to do Bones. I'm going to sit in here nice and peaceful like until I decide it's time to do what I came here to do. Then I'm going to break out of here and do it. And along the way, I think I'll kill all your little friends down here, except maybe that hottie with the eyepatch. I like her, she's got some spunk."

"I'd stop you long before you have a chance to hurt anyone else. I'm not the little kid you remember."

"Trust me, you won't last ten seconds. You'll be a fun one to kill kid, you've got attitude, always have. I think I'll gut you, then while you're still alive to see it I'll kill those brats I apparently didn't finish off right in front of you, nice and slow. Then I'll take that spiky little skull of your's and make myself a nice hat out of it."

Evan slammed the tiny door shut and stalked off, Sabretooth's guttural laugh echoing through the door.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author notes found in the forums**

* * *

**4**

Havok ducked back behind the cover the small hillock provided, narrowly avoiding the shots fired from the two gunmen across the field. He stuck his hand over the edge to fire a few shots of his plasma powers randomly. He doubted he'd actually hit anything, but it would probably keep them from advancing any closer to their position. Beside him, Mirage was beginning to look a little panicked so he gave her a crooked smile. "Rogue sure is sadistic, isn't she?"

Alex had no idea how long they had been in the Danger Room, but it felt like it had been hours. Rogue had ended their warm-up exercises and activated the program she had prepared, saying it was a simple program designed to ease them into working as a team with the simple goal of capturing a flag that was on the other side of small copse of trees. Then everything had gone to hell. They had barely begun even thinking about strategy when a giant fist had slammed into Colossus, sending the big Russian soaring into the air, Juggernaut running after him with a laugh. From there the rest of them had been attacked by various Brotherhood members and any semblance of teamwork fell apart.

The original members of the New Mutants banded together for a little while, but they lacked a clear leader. In the past, Iceman had often served as a defacto leader, his ringleader status in their outside antics translating into a field leader position in training. With him now "off the team" so to speak, no one had stepped into that role. The heavy combat orientated training session that Rogue had just sprung on them had also thrown them off. Ever since the X-Men's loss at the Vault, the majority of the training for everyone at the institute had been combat related, but up until now they always had either Wolverine or Beast acting as their leader. Rogue had given them their goals and stepped out of the room.

The rest of the class did no better. Gambit disappeared almost immediately after Rogue, Colossus was occupied, and Wildthing laid eyes on a representation of the ninja she had fought at the Vault and attacked with a ferocious yell. With everyone scattering, Havok did the only thing he could think of. He stayed behind and protected Dani. The young Cheyanne's powers didn't lend herself to battle as much as his own, and he could see the panic on her face the second everything erupted into chaos.

"It'll be okay, stick with me," he had said, trying to keep his face calm like he had seen his brother do. She nodded with a grim smile and the two followed in the wake of everyone else.

Which led them to this small gorge carved into the ground on the other side of the trees. Across the field in front of them, two Acolytes Alex recognized as Sage and Bishop stood with guns drawn. They stood at the edge of another line of trees, guarding a staff jammed into the ground with a cloth banner bearing the helmet of Magneto attached.

"Any ideas?" he asked her.

"I have no idea. There's nothing I can do, my powers won't work on things that aren't really there."

He frowned. "The Danger Room should be able to tell what you're trying to do. How else could Jean use her telepathy, right?"

"I can't do anything to help Alex, I'm useless here."

He could see her wringing her hands, her eyes gaining a wide, jittery look to them. He reached out and took her hand. "I know you're scared Dani, but it'll be all right. You can do a lot right now."

"I'll just end up hurting you too. I can't control my powers!"

"Seriously babe? You freaking out right now and you're not causing nightmares. Seems like control to me. You just got to believe you can do it and I know you can do whatever you need to do. You're doing great so far."

She looked into his blue eyes and she could see he really did believe in her. He wasn't worried that her powers would flair out at the wrong time or at the wrong person if she used them, and he was trusting her to help them win. She took a deep breath and forced herself to relax as she let it out. "Okay. So what do we do?"

"That's the Dani I know," he said with a grin, squeezing her hand tightly briefly, his thumb rubbing gently over her knuckles. He could see the blush rise in her face despite her darker skin and it made him smile more.

Above them more gunshots flew over their head as Wildthing rolled over the edge of their barrier and crashed into a heap next to them. Her uniform was slashed open along her stomach and several cuts ran the length of one of her thighs, though any actual damage to her body had long healed. A burn on her right shoulder from where she had just been shot by the energy pistols the enemy were firing was already healing.

"Stupid hologram ninja is hard to track," she muttered, though Havok couldn't tell if it was supposed to be some sort of explanation or just angry muttering to herself. She took a long sniff in the air but stopped and cocked her head towards Mirage. A strange look of confusion passed over Wildthing's face as she tried to puzzle out what she smelled.

"What?" Mirage asked, yanking back her hand from Havok. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Um, I think it's something we're supposed to gossip about in the bathroom together," the young clone said, and Alex was shocked to see some slight coloring of her cheeks. Dani's own blush just seemed to grow deeper.

He scratched his head. "I just missed something, didn't I?"

"It's nothing!" Dani said too quickly, and she glared at the other girl.

"I notice those type of scents after I've been around Piotr and—"

"Shut up Laura!" Dani yelled.

Alex on the other hand had a slight revelation and grinned like an idiot, throwing Dani a wink. The other girl buried her head in her hands in embarrassment.

"It's okay," Wildthing started, "I imagine it's natural. I—" she stopped and sniffed again. "Ninja bitch!" Her claws snapped out of her fists and she made to lunge back into the woods behind them.

Havok reached out and grabbed her wrist. Wildthing jerked as her momentum came to an abrupt stop. She whipped her head around, her long hair slapping Mirage in her face. "What the hell are you doing?!" she snarled at him.

"Getting into grudge matches with some hologram of the chick you want to kill isn't the mission. We need to get the flag and we need to work together here."

Her nostrils flared out in anger and for a second Havok had to wonder if she was going to turn her claws on him. But with a final huff she sheathed her claws. "Fine. Plan?"

Mirage smiled at him. "You sounded kind of like your brother there."

Havok frowned a bit. "I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not."

"Right now I'd say it's a good thing. What's the plan, O' Fearless Leader?"

"Crap, he's going to be gushing like he finally got me to live up to the family name when he hears about this."

The underbrush behind them rustled and out spilled Multiple and Wolfsbane in her wolf form. The two crawled over to the three and Rahne shifted back. "I have Toad distracted with some of my clones, and Sunspot and Cannonball are tied up with Blob," Jamie said with a smile. "No idea about Boomer and Magma."

"And Aye bit Quicksilver in the leg so he won't be running for a while," Rahne said with a grin. "How's everyone here?"

"Alex is turning into Scott!" Mirage said before anyone could say anything.

"Aww, that's no fun!" Rahne whined.

"We'll miss you when you go away to get the stick put it," Jamie said with a sad look.

"Dude, I am not my brother, chill out everyone. And you stop telling everyone that!" he glared at Dani, who stuck her tongue out at him. "Look, we're getting a butts kicked because we're all running around instead of working together. I hate Scott harping on everyone as much as you guys, but he'd probably be a little right if he was on our cases right now. So we need to get past those two—"

"Ninja bitch is out there too now," Wildthing growled.

"She is?" Havok said, risking a quick peak over the edge of the ditch. Sure enough, the ninja was standing next to Bishop, sword drawn. "Crap, okay, we need to get past those three and get the flag."

"Aye can run that far quick an' easy, but I need a distraction ta keep them off of me," Wolfsbane offered.

"I can lay down some cover fire, but that's only going to do so much. How about you Mirage? Can you pull them into a nightmare?"

She frowned, but thought carefully before answering. "Maybe, for a second or two. It's too hard to focus on them since they're not real people. Any much longer and I'd probably lose control and end up hitting all of us instead."

"Few seconds is better than nothing."

A crashing noise came from the woods and out walked the gleaming form of Colossus. Several blaster shots bounced off his metal skin without doing any more damage than a few burnt smudges before he ducked down into the ditch with the other mutants.

"The simulation of Juggernaut does not do him justice," the big man's voice rumbled. He smiled at them. "I am glad to see all of you are well. The others?"

"MIA right now," Alex said. He glanced over everyone before grinning. "Okay, now that Pitor's here, new plan."

------------

Rogue stood in the command center for the Danger Room, watching the action below through a mix of windows and monitors. So far, they had acted just like she had predicted they would for a first run. There was little to no sense of teamwork involved in what her class was doing, with everyone scattering once the first punch was landed on Colossus. A few team ups here and there, but there wasn't any planning or reason for the pairs other than whoever they were closest to at the time. Even the few who managed to coordinate some sort of counter-attack against the Acolyte simulations weren't working together, they were just attacking the same target.

The door opened and Logan walked in. "How they doing?" he asked, taking a sip from the coffee he was carrying.

"Ah've seen the Brotherhood fight better together," she said with a huff. "Professor expects meh to start working miracles?"

"Can't be that bad," he said, pushing some buttons on one of the consoles and quickly scanning through the high speed playback that began. "Where is Charles anyways?"

"He's upstairs. Scott and the others are on their way back." She waved her hand to the scene below them. "Seriously Logan, they got nothing together. They're out there just flailin' around. And that damn Swamp Rat just up an' disappeared."

"Hmm," he grunted. "Looks like Surferboy is catching on at least." On the screen, Rogue could see Havok defending Mirage.

She scoffed. "Surprise, surprise. Give a Summers a gal to protect and he'll go to the moon an' back, so it's nothin' that special... Well, wait, look at this," she said, pointing out what was happening below. A group of them had managed to all make it to the same place, a last bit of cover before a stretch of open field to the flag, currently guarded by representations of Sage, Bishop and Revanche. The team members were all looking at Alex, who was scratching on the ground a plan of some sorts. "Maybe there's more ta him then we thought?"

"Let's see how it works out," Logan said, crossing his arms and waiting for the show to start.

He didn't wait long, as a beep indicated that Mirage had activated her powers and was using them on the simulations. From training Jean, Wolverine knew that the Room couldn't simulate real minds well enough to provide a true experience for the girl, but the computer analyzed her attack and attempted to reflect the results it would have. It was a brief burst, causing all three Acolytes to react to some unseen terror, but each of them were only dazed momentarily. It was long enough though.

From behind the edge of the hill, Colossus stood up with Wildthing perched in his palm, like some bizarre statue he was showing off. Logan couldn't figure out what that could possibly accomplish until the big man threw the tiny girl like a baseball. She rocketed across the field with her claws extended, a scream of fury on her face.

"Huh, wonder if Tinman could do that to me?" he mused out loud. Rogue shot him a grin.

Wildthing flipped at the last minutes, bringing her foot claws in first as she slammed, not into Revanche as Logan would have expected knowing his clone's massive grudge against the ninja, but into Bishop. As the first set of claws hit the tall black man in the legs, Wildthing continued the flip and brought the four claws from her hands down into the man's chest, knocking him to the ground. Her momentum was so strong that she then rolled twice before righting herself and turning to attack her next target.

Rogue and Logan had been so distracted by the living projectile, they missed the start of everything else that happened. Havok popped up from the ground farther down the line from where he had been and began pelting Revanche with blasts of plasma from his fists. He hit her once in the shoulder before she recovered and dropped to the ground. Sage had begun to track her gun over to Havok's new position, but had to react suddenly to the thundering steps of Colossus. He had paused only long enough to provide proper follow through when throwing Wildthing, and then took off at a run down the field towards Sage. Her shots pinged of the freight train heading towards her and she barely threw herself out of the way in time to avoid being shoulder checked.

With the defenders properly distracted, a mob of Multiples swarmed out of the bunker and began a rush towards the flag. Revanche and Sage each tried to make an effort to stop them, Revanche was still under fire from Havok while Colossus and Wildthing were both moving in on Sage.

Suddenly the Danger Room holograms shut down. Logan and Rogue each checked to see why Room would consider the program done when none of the Multiples had come close to the flag yet. It was Rogue who noticed first, and with a slap to his arm got Logan's attention. Sitting in the middle of the Danger Room, her tail wagging as Mirage pet her was Wolfsbane, flag in mouth. The entire thing had been one long distraction for the wolf.

"Damn fine bit of team work there," Logan commented with grudging respect. "Might be something there after all."

"Funny it only came from the youngest or newest members. What happened with the rest?" Rogue said with a sly look at the older teacher.

"They're Hank, Jean and Scott's students, not mine. Better get down there and debrief Teach."

She smirked at his dismissal of responsibility and thumbed a button. "Good job ya'll," she said into the loudspeaker's microphone. "Quick meeting in the debriefing room an' ya'll 'ill be free to go."

Down in the Danger Room proper, those that had been a part of the actual push to victory were gathered around each other congratulating each other on a job well done. The rest of class were pulling themselves up off the ground, most nursing a number of small wounds. All around them, tiny service robots were scooping up damaged bits of the room and beginning repairs. With Rogue's announcement, they moved through the now open door to the room across the hall, sinking into the comfortable chairs.

Rogue and Logan both entered from a stairwell that lead from the control room and took their place at the front of the room. "First off," the southerner began, "good work from the group that got the flag. Ya'll came up with a plan an' picked your targets well."

"What did they do?" Tabitha asked, tenderly rubbing her elbow.

"You can watch the replay later if ya want. But they made some smart choices, having Wildthing hit the guy who could absorb Havok's shots, and sending Colossus after the girl with the gun that couldn't hurt him."

"Who came up with the fastball?" Logan asked.

"Piotr and I did," Laura said.

"Nice move. Want to try that myself sometime."

"Anyway," Rogue continued, "good bit of teamwork once you started using it. What happened to the rest of ya?"

There was a small din of chatter from the rest of the students. Rogue held up her hand to quiet them. "Yeah, save it. Ah purposely sat this one out ta see what ya'll had on your own. Ah know ya'll can work on together as a team, Ah've seen it. Why didn't Ah get that today?"

"You could argue we were busy distracting the rest of the Brotherhood," Roberto tried.

"Ah could, but Ah won't 'cause that's a load of bull. Magma?" Rogue asked, a bit surprised to see the girl raising her hand.

"None of us are really leaders. We've always had Mr. McCoy or Logan with us. You just threw us out there with no one."

"True. Eventually Havok stepped up, but it took him a while. But ya'll are good enough and been doing this long enough that ya can do okay without someone always callin' the shots. What happens if Ah'm your leader an' someone lahke Quicksilver sucker punches meh? Ya'll just gonna fall apart?"

She looked out on the crowd and for the most part the entire room was taking a good long look at themselves and their actions, even those that had eventually teamed up to get the flag. "Look, Ah'm not trying ta be too hard on you, since Ah'm supposed to be teaching ya these things an' not just expectin' ya'll to be perfect off the bat. But Ah need you ta know this ain't a game no more, an' ya'll need to step it up ta the next level. We gotta work as a team. We got some of ya that have been here a while, an' people like Piotr, Alex and Laura who ain't. We gotta get everyone on the same page, an' we gotta think of better ways for us all ta work together. Homework..."

There was collective groan from most of the room.

"Homework!" she continued, "Quick paper. Write meh what you could have done better. Look at who you paired up with, if anyone, an' who ya fought."

"What do you mean?" Roberto asked.

"Okay, think about this. You an' Sam teamed up. Bothaya are more physical guys an' ya went up against Blob, who ain't hurt much by things hittin' him. Magma an' Boomer are both more ranged an' went against Pyro. Yeah, Amara's immune to his fire, but he can get around hers. Blob on the other hand mighta thought twice if ya lit him on fire. Ya'll teamed up with your friends rather than thinking strategically. Think about things like that. Now go on an' get cleaned up an' go have some fun. Ah'll be around if ya want to talk about the homework."

The class broke up, most heading straight out the door for the showers, talking amongst themselves about what Rogue had said. Laura, on the other hand, walked right up to Rogue and looked up at the taller girl. "I'm not a team player."

Rogue laughed and could hear Logan chuckling behind her. "Ah know that Laura, doesn't mean we ain't going ta try and change that. 'Sides, you did pretty good there at the end. You recognized Alex takin' charge an' ya stayed instead of runnin' your own fight."

Laura studied Rogue's face a moment before nodding and leaving the room. Rogue laughed again. "You've got a weird kid Logan."

"If you want to call her my kid. Not really sure what to call her myself."

"Been a coupla months. Shouldn't ya have figured that out by now?"

Logan let out a sigh that came out more of a growl than he intended. "I don't know. She's me but not me. Part daughter, part kid sister, part total stranger with a similar story. I treat her the same as I treat the rest of you and it seems to work out okay."

"Then you know she looks up to ya same as most of us do right?"

Logan didn't say anything, though she thought there might have been a bit of a smile in his eyes. He clasped a hand affectionately to her shoulder. "You did good today Rogue. I think the speech might have gotten through to them. Like I told you, some things they need to hear from one of their own."

She smiled. "Thanks Logan." The smile quickly turned to a look of smoldering anger as she remembered on last piece of business she had to finish. "Could you tell the Professor how it went for meh?"

"And why can't you?"

"'Cause Ah need to beat the hell out of a worthless Swamp Rat."

Logan smirked. "Just remember what I've taught you about roughing someone up."

That broke her anger a bit. "Of course!"

She didn't have far to look after leaving the briefing room, as Gambit was leaning against the closed door to the Danger Room.

"Très Magnifique Chere. Dey a special group o' kids, non?"

Rogue didn't bother saying anything as she walked up to him and slammed him against the wall, her arm pinning him across his chest just under his throat. She had no problem manhandling Remy. She might have only been the second tallest woman at the mansion behind Jean, but she had a hell of a lot more muscle on her than the redhead.

"Chere, dis be a bit forward fo' you, not dat I don't like—"

"Shut up. Where the hell did ya go in there?"

"You say de mission is ta get de flag. I make a livin' takin' t'ings dat don't want ta be taken. Not fair fo' de udders if Gambit play. 'Sides, I'm no' much of a team player."

"That's the whole point ya idiot! You wanted to stay here because it's a sweet place ta live, fahne. But if ya wanna be on the team, you do what you're supposed ta do an' you go where you're supposed ta go. You ever ditch out on training lahke that again, Ah will have the Professor boot ya out of here before we're done stretching. And if it's mah class you think ya can just walk out on, Ah'll have Wolverine carve your ass up before tossin' ya aside! Got it?"

"Come now Chere..." he tried to start.

"Don't 'Chere' me! You've lost whatever points you'd gained with me. Think about that next tahme ya want ta pull a stunt lahke this."

"Is there a problem here?" a voice came from towards the elevators. Rogue didn't bother reigning in the fury on her face as she turned to see Scott at the end of the hall, covered in grime and carrying a backpack worth of gear to be stowed.

"Nah, we're done here." She took her weight off of Gambit, pulling him off the wall and shoving him towards the elevators in silent dismissal. The Cajun mutant straightened his jacket and made his way away from the scene with a stride that did little to show what had just happened, though Scott could see it buried under the mask of casualness on the other man's face.

Scott waited until Remy had left before turning back to Rogue. "Good day then?" he asked with an attempt at a smile, hoping to defuse rather than redirect his friend's rage.

"Ha!" she let out in a humorless laugh. She sank down onto one of the benches built into the wall next to the Danger Room door. "Let's see, Ah've got a class that consists of kids who apparently have no idea what teamwork is an' one prick of a man who think he can do whatever he wants. Ah'm great, how about you?"

"Long day drudging through the sewers with a claustrophobic woman who can make hurricanes," Scott answered, sitting down next to her.

"Meh," she dismissed it with a wave of her hand.

"And I had to talk to Spyke."

"...Eh, okay. Your day sucked too. Anything interestin' happening down there?"

"He says he was just getting medicine for a few sick kids, but everyone agrees he was probably hiding something, so who knows."

"Great, Morlock problems on top of Magneto recruitin' an army. Ah miss just duking it out with the Brotherhood, so much less complicated."

"I hear you." They sat in companionable silence for a little while before Scott had to say something. "Rogue, I really am sorry if anything I said made the Professor pick you for this."

"Eh, forget it Scott. Ah guess it's a bit flatterin' ya'll seem ta think I'd do a good job. An' if Remy wasn't pissin' meh off this way he'd fahnd some other way. Plus everyone else wasn't that bad. Hell, Alex even turned out ta be a halfway decent leader in the end."

"Alex? Really?"

"Came up with a plan ta save the day an' everything. Even got compared to you by a few people. 'Course, he did spend most of the class worryin' about Dani. Talk about déjà-Summers-vu."

"Gee, thanks. I like to think I wasn't that bad."

"An' Ah'm sure ya do think that," she said with a smile, nudging his shoulder with her own. "But Ah think it is different for Alex."

"How so?"

She stood up and grinned. "Dani knows he exists. Now hit the showers Summers, ya smellin' up the place."

-------------

Upstairs in the large and finely decorated office of Charles Xavier, the team that had ventured out into the Morlock tunnels was dispersing. Scott had left early to take the gear downstairs and clean up (he had somehow managed to come off worse for wear down in the sewers), while the others had remained to debate theories as to what might be happening beneath their feet, joined by Hank and a few of the other X-Men on hand that were not part of Rogue's training group.

The debate was going no where productive, as there were few definitive clues to go on, so when the Professor noticed a slight tension in Jean's face he called an end to the meeting. "It would seem your initial conclusions are correct, until we know more we must wait. Thank you all for taking the time and effort to seek out Evan, enjoy the rest of your afternoon. Jean, if you would stay a moment."

It didn't take long for the others to leave, and soon it was just Xavier on one side of his desk and Jean sitting on the other. Charles spent a moment studying the girl, not looking into her mind but merely reading her body language. Her eyes would not meet his, and once again she tensed for a moment before relaxing slighting.

"Jean, you realize whatever the problem is you can come to me, don't you?" he began softly.

"I know Professor," was her quiet reply.

"How long have your powers been giving you trouble?"

"Most of my life?" she said with a small smile. Xavier simply raised an eyebrow at her. She sighed in response. "I've been having problems for a few weeks now. They seem to happen sporadically though and only last a few seconds at a time."

"I see. Are they similar to what occurred a few years ago?"

"A bit. I haven't had any problems with my telekinesis, though I have noticed it is getting stronger."

"We expected this as you grew older and more comfortable with your abilities."

She nodded. "It's my telepathy that is surging. It's more intense than it was last time. Instead of just hearing those around me, it's like for a moment I can hear everything."

"Everything?"

She nodded again. "Whenever I try to use Cerebro, when I first put on the helmet and before I can focus, it's like for a second I can hear millions of thoughts at once, like whispers. Too quiet to make out but so many that it's deafening. Does that ever happen to you?"

"It's been some time, but yes, when I first started using Cerebro I found myself in similar situations. Is this what these surges are like for you?"

"Yes. There are too many thoughts to pick out what anyone is saying, but it's so many I know it can't just be stray thoughts of those around me. It's like I'm... tapping into something bigger than me."

Xavier found it hard to keep his face neutral, but he did manage it. Years of practice while listening to Erik's rants about humanities faults helped in that regard. "There are many theories," he began after a moment, "regarding a shared consciousness that all minds are at least subconsciously attuned to, through an Astral Plane. It is possible that this is what your mind is attempting to access."

"But why?" she said, fear lacing her voice. "The last year or so all I've had to deal with is the occasional stray thought that someone was thinking too loudly to ignore. Why is this happening to me now?"

"I don't know. I suspect that it is simply coinciding with your telekinesis increase, a maturing of your powers. I might not have experienced the same phenomenon as you are when my own powers were developing, but there were many points in my youth where the control I had was no longer sufficient. If you would like, I could take a look to see if perhaps there is something in your subconscious that is driving these surges."

"Do you think there is?"

"No, I believe it is merely your powers continuing to develop; but like out recent encounter with the Morlocks, it is best to check all avenues."

Jean nodded. "Okay."

Xavier pulled his wheelchair out from under his desk and circled around until he was sitting directly in front of Jean. "Try to relax," he said as he placed his hands on her head, his fingertips resting gently on her temples. Jean took a deep breath and let it out with a sigh

With a rush, Xavier found himself standing in a wide open plain of tall grass blowing in the wind. For what seemed like miles in every direction there didn't appear to be a thing, just simply a sun touched field with a gently summer breeze. With nothing to see here, Xavier began to probe deeper. His feet lifting off the ground and he was soaring through the air. As he traveled, he could see parts of Jean's mind take shape. He could see the mansion shimmer into existence, with crowds of students swarming around it like ants as they went along with their day. To his right he saw a tower appear, made of the same ruby quartz as Scott's visor, no doubt storing her memories of her soulmate. He smiled to see just how prominent his first student was in his second's mind, and at that the tower seemed to continue upwards until it was past the barriers of her mind. Their psychic bond, he thought to himself.

He continued like this for some time, flying over her mind and seeing just vague glimpses of things important to her such as her college, her family, even their enemies until at last he came to series of cliff faces. He landed before the first series of natural walls which lead to her power. Two giant cliffs rose up before him to either side, while between them was a large canyon that created a corridor between the two mountains. Scattered along the ground were bricks of stone that once made up mental blocks that Xavier had built for Jean when she was younger to contain the massive amount of mental power that overwhelmed her. Most of these walls were broken when Jean's powers began to surge several years ago. Still a few had remained. Walking deeper into the canyon, he found the remains of several others he had though would still be standing. However, most of them seemed to have naturally eroded as he had intended them to as her mind stabilized through her turbulent teenage years. One gave of the distinct impression be being forced through by Jean herself, with lingering feelings of himself among the energies there. He guessed this wall fell when he had been under the control of Apocalypse. Jean had pushed herself harder than she ever had before then, unlocking even more of her potential on her own by sheer necessity.

He came to one last wall, this one still standing though cracks were forming. This was not a wall created by himself when he first discovered Jean. In fact, he could get no reading off where this last block had come from. It felt a bit like Jean herself, but at the same time felt very much like something else entirely. Behind this wall is what I fear, he thought to himself. Behind the wall lay some hidden power or at the very least the conduit to it. Steeling himself, he stepped up to the wall and placed his hands upon it. Beneath his hands he felt power throbbing, the likes of which he had only encountered twice before, both of the times he had directly confronted Apocalypse. It was a power that was still sleeping, but preparing to awaken when necessary.

Later, he would think back on his next move as incredibly foolish, as well as arrogant. But with his protégé in potential danger, he felt he had to act. He gathered his own mental strength and began pulling the shattered stones from the previous walls to him, attempting to shore up this last barrier.

The reaction was immediate. Light flared from the cracks in the wall, bright oranges and reds of a raging inferno piercing the stone blocks, and with them the cry of a bird of prey.

Xavier jerked back in his wheel chair, his hands sliding off of Jean's head as she pulled back at the same time. "Did you feel it, the surge?!" she asked after a moment.

"Yes," Xavier said, struggling to keep his voice steady. "It is certainly intense. I can see why you are concerned."

"Could you make up what the whispers were saying?"

"Whispers?" he asked. Could Jean not hear what he heard, felt what he felt in that rush of power?

"Yes, it was like all the other times, millions of whispers at once."

"Hmm, I heard only the loud noise, I could not hear anything distinct," he lied.

"Is there something wrong with me?" she asked, anxiousness readily apparent in her voice.

Xavier forced a smile, hoping it appeared natural. "No, I truly do believe it is merely your powers coming to their full maturity. The various exercises we developed when you were younger should help to strengthen your control over the new influx of power."

Jean let out a sigh of relief and gave the Professor a stunning smile. "Thank you Professor, I was getting really worried. The last thing I want is to lose control."

"Completely understandable," the Professor said softly. "If I may ask though, have you talked to Scott about this? He was after all a great help during your last power surge."

For a moment he could see her look nervous again. "No," she said at last. "I don't want to trouble him with this. He's worried about enough things with Magneto and now Evan. If I can handle this on my own I will."

"I saw the bond between the two of you, quite a remarkable thing to see, even if it was just my mind creating a visualization of it. I'm surprised he cannot sense your distress."

"I'm blocking it from him," she sat up straight, visibly taking ownership for her decision. "Like I said, I don't want him worrying about something he can't control, especially if you say it's something I can work through on my own. It might be a bond formed between us, but I have control over it, more than he does anyways." A thought seemed to cross her mind. "Is that normal? I would think even though I am the telepath that something like this would be more mutual."

"Honestly, I've never formed such a bond myself, and the only other one I've ever encountered was formed between two telepaths. I was rather surprised to learn about yours, though it does make me extraordinarily happy to see that your feelings for each other are so strong."

"Me too," she said with a smile. For once in this conversation, Xavier found his own smile coming to him naturally instead of one he had to force for his student's comfort.

"I do think you should consider telling him, as he has proven to be quite the anchor for you in the past. But it is of course your decision."

Jean stood. "I will Professor, I just don't want to give him one more thing to brood over right now. You know Scott, as much of the world's weight on his shoulders as he can get."

"Yes, one of his main faults I'm afraid. You have been quite the anchor for him in that regard."

Jean smiled, and gave her mentor a tight hug. "Thank you for everything. I should probably find him before he starts over analyzing this afternoon's mission."

"And I wish you luck with that." She gave a small laugh and went to the door, though Xavier stopped her with one last statement. "If anything changes Jean, please come to me immediately."

"Of course Professor, thank you again." She slipped out the door.

With a sigh, Charles moved his chair to the window and stared out the glass to the grounds of his school. More than ever, the weight of things that he glimpsed in Apocalypse's mind pressed down on him. He had tried to discount those things when he was first recovering from his encounter with the ancient Pharaoh, but now as evidence began piling up, he was beginning to think he may have seen the actual future. The power residing in Jean was just the latest, perhaps the worst. As optimistic as he was about mutants and humans co-existing, the vision of Sentinels and human protests could become a reality at any time and he half expected at least some rogue faction inside the government to attempt a war at some point. Erik's continued antagonism of humanity was another factor adding to that possibility. Despite that, Charles always felt cooler heads would prevail and his dream would be fulfilled. Even if things continued towards those visions he had seen with Apocalypse, he felt there was always a chance to avert them. This problem with Jean though seemed to not only be a reality, but possibly unchangeable.

He had told no one the exact details of his visions except for Irene Adler. Destiny had offered that each was a possibility but that the future was always in motion, and many paths existed. But these powers in Jean, this creature that was both Jean and not, seemed determine to come true. He had sensed it willing, for now, to lay primarily dormant, but it was growing stronger and it was preparing Jean for the day it would emerge. He had no clue if it would be a force for good or evil, but in his vision they had lost Jean because of it.

He rubbed his face, hoping to relieve some of the tension. No matter how much he monitored this situation, would he be able to do anything before it was too late? Was he even supposed to? Not for the first time he cursed his curiosity that had caused him to dig into Apocalypse's mind in those moment when he could. What good was knowing a future that could not be changed?

"Chuck!" a gruff voice and firm hand on his shoulder pulled him out of his thoughts. Looking up he saw Logan standing next to him, his face creased in concern. "You okay? Called your name half a dozen times."

"Yes, sorry Logan, too many things on my mind."

"Anything I should know about?" Logan asked, sitting down on the edge of the window.

"Not at the moment at least."

"Hmm," he grunted. Count on Logan to both not believe him but accept Charles's decision anyways. "Saw Scott downstairs, nothing with the Morlocks then?"

"There is more there than we are aware of, but unless we start combing the sewers for clues we'll have to let them keep their secrets."

"I could go down there you know, maybe take the kid with me, sniff around."

Charles considered this. "No, ultimately I think that would simply antagonize them more. It's my hope that by respecting their wishes now they might be more inclined to accept assistance when they truly need our help."

"This is Spyke we're talking about, he's probably neck deep in something right now," Logan offered with a shake of his head. "Your call though."

"Evan always did have a talent for finding trouble. Still, we must respect their privacy. How did Rogue's lesson go? I haven't been able to read much more than seething anger from her, but I suspect she's purposely sending that towards me."

Logan chuckled. "I don't doubt it. She's frustrated by the whole thing. Rogue tossed them into the deep end to see what would happen. Most of the class fell apart without one of us leading them, though Alex seemed to step up in the end and put together a decent effort from a few of them."

"Alex, really? Scott must be ecstatic."

"Yeah well don't tell Surferboy that," Logan laughed. "Overall Rogue did a great job. Showed them their weaknesses and got them to think about changing them. Oh, and the Cajun ditched out once she started the simulation. She had some choice words with him when she ran into him in the halls."

"Mr. LeBeau certainly enjoys getting under Rogue's skin. Is there going to be a continued problem there?"

"Like I said, choice words. Want me to make sure they sink in?"

A smile crossed Xavier's face. "Why do I get the impression you're planning to do that anyways?"

Logan shrugged. "Because you know me well enough to know that I am. Just thought I'd pretend to ask though."

"Try not to cause too much damage when you speak to him, and if possible, don't hurt him."

-------------

Jean sat wrapped in a towel, brushing her wet hair out as she looked at her reflection in the mirror. Was the Professor right? Was it just her powers ramping up to the next level and she had to simply get used to it? She didn't think he would lie to her, but she couldn't help but feel there was more going on than that simple explanation. Aside from these bursts of thoughts, she didn't feel particularly more powerful when it came to her telepathy.

She sighed and put down the brush. She should probably tell Scott about it. If this had the potential to become another problem like a few years ago, he would be better off forewarned.

'Scott, I need to talk to you,' she called out to him with her mind.

She didn't have to wait long before there was a knock on her door. She mentally waved him in, and the door opened to reveal her boyfriend. "Jean, what's wrong, I, whoa!" He saw her with still damp hair, just a towel on, and long legs crossed in front of her as she turned to face him and he quickly shut the door behind him.

Jean grinned, always appreciative of Scott's reactions to her. "Something wrong? You've seen me in less after all."

"No, nothing wrong at all," he said, swallowing down a brief stutter. "You sounded worried when you called though."

"I," she started to say, but stopped herself. She still wanted to avoid adding more to Scott's worries, and here he was for the moment without much of a care at all. Why ruin that? "It's nothing; I was just being silly and was missing you."

Worry lines crossed his forehead. "Are you sure? If something's wrong you know I'm here for you."

'He's going to worry anyways,' she thought. She stood and firmly planted a deep kiss on him to stop him from talking. He stood shocked for just an instant before his arms wrapped around her and he committed fully to the kiss,

Through the bond they shared, Jean could feel the worry slipping away and be replaced with overwhelming love for her. 'This was all I need,' she thought. 'He loves me so much, with that I can get through anything.' She moved one hand to cup behind his neck while the other reached down and undid the bunch that held her towel closed, letting it fall to ground around her ankles.

Scott paused at this. "Are you sure, Logan's around—"

"I've made it perfectly clear to Logan that we're adults now and can do what we want as long as we're safe and discrete." She kissed along his jaw line, finally coming to nibble gently on his earlobe. "Besides he's busy hunting for Gambit right now."

Scott shivered at the sensation she was causing and ginned. "Sucks to be Gambit," he said, running his hands down her body.

"And it's great to be Scott Summers," she said with a smile, falling backwards onto her bed and pulling her boyfriend down with her. Love continued to shine through their bond, and Jean basked in it. 'Why ruin it,' Jean thought again. If she could take the burden of another problem he couldn't control from him, it was worth it. Nothing wrong could come from that.


	5. Chapter 5

5

Suzanne Chan could remember a time when her biggest worry in life was figuring out where she was going to go to college. The daughter of two naturalized immigrants from Hong Kong, Suzie felt her parents had worked far too hard in life to provide her with everything she would need to be successful. It would be an insult to them if she did not to worry about where she would be receiving her higher education. Yet even as the pressure to succeed sometimes got to her, she managed to balance her extremely busy life well. That part had always been a mystery to most people, since Suzie was not only involved in many things in and out of school, but usually was the best at everything she tried. She was a star student, popular at her San Francisco high school, a talented musician, active in the student government, an impressive member of the school's cross country team, and in her senior year she added actress to her list of achievements when she starred in the fall musical. Suzie was everywhere at her high school, and everyone loved her. She had had a few boyfriends, none that lasted but all that ended in solid friendships. She couldn't have been happier with her life, especially when three colleges were offering her scholarships before winter break even began.

For over a year her heart had been set on Barnard College, and when the offer came in the mail she had bounced down the hall to dining room, ecstatically begging her parents to take her to visit the campus. It took them some time to understand their rapidly yelling daughter, but they agreed and the three of them booked a flight to New York City. It was the trip of a lifetime for Suzie. The campus was everything she hoped it would be, the city was full of excitement and adventure, and they had even seen Spider-Man swinging above them as they walked down Broadway looking for a show to see. To Suzie, it was the most magical place she had ever been too, and while it would be a big change, she couldn't wait to start the next step of her life in the Big Apple.

Change occurred far sooner than Suzanne ever anticipated. On their last night in New York they had gone to Chinatown for dinner when a fight between two rival gangs broke out. Automatic weapon fire filled the air, tearing apart stands and window fronts as panic and chaos filled the street. The bullets came towards the Chan family, Suzie's parents futilely trying to duck out of the way when the rounds hit their bodies. They landed slumped against the brick wall of the building they stood in front of. But Suzie didn't move; she stayed standing, frozen in fear, in the path of the same burst of fire that had killed her parents.

When the police finally arrived on the scene, they were baffled as to how Suzanne was alive. They were at a loss of words to explain how she stood in the middle of a bullet storm and didn't suffer a single wound. She herself didn't know, but could express this as her mind shut down in shock. The paramedics escorted the girl to a waiting squad car, which then drove her to a local hospital. The doctors there confirmed that she received no wounds, not even a graze. She was placed in a private room where she stayed for two days without saying a word to anyone. Her mind kept replaying what had happened. At first she would just see her parents gunned down. But as time went on and her mind started to comprehend the horror that had just occurred, she began to focus on what had happened to her, why she had survived. And as crazy as it sounded to her, she could swear that she had seen the bullets slow down and stop in front of her.

On the third day she began speaking again, starting with asking for a glass of water and followed by questions about what had happened. The police informed her that they knew at least which gangs were involved, but other than that had very few leads on who had done the shooting. When they left, Suzie changed back into her clothes and made her way out of the hospital. She spent another three days at the hotel room, which the hotel graciously told her she could use as long as she needed. She mourned for the first day, but as the days went on she began to accept everything that had happened. The only two points that stopping her from closure, or as much as she ever expected to get, was that the killers were still out there, and that she had no idea how she managed to survive. She decided to revisit where it happened, that maybe she could find some clue the police missed or jog her memory as to what had happened to spare her life. Hailing a cab, she returned to Chinatown.

Though the area was riddled with bullet holes, the police tape around the crime scene was gone, as was any blood that had been left behind. Suzanne fell to her knees and cried, unbeknown to her in the same exact spot she had stood three days before. She was shaken out of her tears by a strange sensation, a wave of vertigo passing through her. Using the wall to steady herself, she turned to look around and found herself staring at the back of her own head. This vision of her was a pale, transparent blue figure, frozen in place. On both sides of this transparent version of Suzie stood her parents, and in front of them, driving around the corner was a ghostly version of the gang's car. She watched in horror again as her parents were slain, but this time she noticed something she had been too terrified to see the last time she lived through the shootout. Curiosity overwhelming horror, she walked around the ghost in front of her to see the misty bullets flying towards her past self slow down and stop three feet in front of the paralyzed girl.

Astonished, she quickly scanned the street around her. No one else seemed able to see what she was seeing, the few people walking the street this early ignoring her and the phantoms as they went about their business. She stared at the scene again. Her parents had fallen, the ghost of her past self was still frozen in fear, and the bullets coming to her were frozen in.... she wasn't sure what was stopping them. Looking behind her, she was surprised to see the car, which had sped by so fast she could hardly remember what it looked like, was now crawling down the street at a walking pace, the gang members inside it all moving in slow motion. Suzie wasn't sure how long this vision would last, but it occurred to her that any information she had about this car could help the police catch her parents' killers.

She followed the phantom car for the next hour, the vehicle never traveling faster than a brisk walking pace as if it was allowing her to keep up with it. Eventually it turned into the driveway of a warehouse, where it approached the closed doors before dissipating like a puff of smoke. She crept towards the run down building, and after a few moments to build up her courage, stole a glance through a dirty window. Inside she could see the same people who had been in the car the day of the drive by. Suzie couldn't believe it, she had found the killers. The question was what to do with them. She could call the police and they could come and arrest them, but she wasn't sure how much evidence there was against them. She highly doubted her story of following a transparent car from the past that only she could see being taken seriously. That wouldn't stop the police from being able to track the bullets back to whatever guns these kids had, but there was still a chance that they might get off because of what happened.

The decision of what to do was taken out of her hands by the roar of an engine. Turning, she saw a second car pulling into the driveway, one that was fully corporeal and filled with people. She looked back through the window to see the reaction of the people inside, but found herself face to face with on of the gang members who had moved to check on the noise, the thin glass the only thing separating the two of them. His eyes widened at the site of her, and the car now coming to a stop behind her.

"It's a Dragon spy and her back up! Waste 'em!"

With a scream, Suzanne ducked underneath the window and tried to get out of the line of fire as the two gangs squared off. The newcomers, the Dragons she assumed, had taken positions behind the car and began spraying the side of the warehouse with bullets. The other gang responded in turn, the barrels of guns sticking out from holes cut into the side of the building. And though Suzie had managed to avoid freezing in fear this time, she wasn't able to get out of the way in time. Luckily for her, just as they had days before, the bullets stopped within feet of her. There they were, hovering in midair as if frozen, with new ones joining them with ever flash of a muzzle. When she noticed, Suzie stopped her scurrying and focused on the bizarre phenomenon with mouth half open. She started to reach out to see if she could pluck one out of the air when she heard one of the Dragons yell.

"Look at that, they've got a mutie! Forget about the others, get her!"

"Mutie? Mutant? Was that what was happening? Am I a mutant?' she thought in the split second before a new volley of bullets came towards her, as well as new yelling from those inside the building.

"She's not our freak!" And now all the guns were pointing at her.

"Get the launcher, blow them all to hell!" one of the Dragons yelled, as a second pulled a long tube from the back seat of the car and propped it up to his shoulder. Suzie had no idea if she was a mutant, no idea what her powers were if she was, but she concentrated as hard as she could on that rocket launcher, a silent prayer that whatever had stopped the bullets from hitting her would stop the rocket as well.

A burst of flame and smoke blasted out of the back end of the launcher, but nothing came from the front. Hope soared in Suzie's heart; she had done it! But just as suddenly as the happiness overtook her, despair replaced it. The entire rocket launcher exploded, instantly killing the man holding it and the two others standing near him. The last gang member was thrown across the loading area of the warehouse, landing in an unmoving heap against the wall of the building. The car was also thrown forward, but being heavier it moved just enough to flip it upside down.

Suzie collapsed to her knees in tears for the second time that day. She had just caused the death of four people, not really innocent people, but that hardly entered her mind.

"Holy crap, look what Mutie Girl did!" said one of the first gang members, sticking his head from the building. "She took those Dragons right out."

"We could use a secret weapon like that," said another as they gathered around her sobbing form.

"Forget it, look at her, stupid freak is crying like a baby," said the leader. "Maybe we should do the world a favor and put her down."

"Yeah, good idea."

She felt the barrel of a gun placed on the back of her head, but no shot came. She heard a scream behind her and felt the gun ripped away from her. Daring to look back, she saw the gun taken from the leader's hand and pressed against his temple by an invisible hand. The hammer pulled back, and the gun fired.

"Oh my God, she killed Davey! Fucking mutant killed Davey!"

"Not her man, look!" he frantically pointed into the air.

Suzie turned to follow his gaze, hardly hearing the twin gunshots coming from behind her and the thud of two more bodies hitting the ground. Floating down from the sky was a man in deep red armor, a metal helmet that almost entirely encompassed his head save for a slit on the front through which his face was visible, and a flowing cape that billowed behind him as he settled to the ground, followed by a large metal sphere that landed beside him. The man strode purposely past the flaming wreckage of the car to stand before Suzie, offering her a gloved hand to help her to her feet.

"You're him, aren't you? That mutant from TV. Magneto."

"I am. What is your name?"

"Suzanne Chan." She looked around her at the bodies of the gang members Magneto had just executed. "You killed them," she whispered.

"I killed them to defend your life, the same as you did to their enemies."

"I...I should turn myself in."

"What would that accomplish? You defended yourself, and during your defense your attackers died. Under normal circumstances I'm sure you would be let go with a slap on the wrist, since they are criminals and you are an innocent. But you are a mutant."

"That shouldn't make a difference. I was just trying to save myself; I don't even know what I did."

"I know that child, and in a perfect world you would be commended for your actions. You might still be by the local police force trying to stop these gangs. Unfortunately, there are those in this world who would see you dead just for being different and their power and influence is growing. It is not safe for you here regardless of what you have done."

"I just wanted to go to college, and now my parents are dead and I'm a mutant."

"Believe me when I say I know what it is like to have the world snatch away your hopes and dreams. What I am here to offer you is a new dream. A place where you are free to be who you are, where you do not have to live in fear of those who would destroy you for being different, for being a step forward on the evolutionary path. With my help you can learn how to control your powers and use them to benefit your fellow mutants."

"I don't know, I..."

Magneto held a hand up to quiet her as he cocked his head. In the distance she could make out the sound of police sirens heading their direction. He turned back to the girl. "I would normally allow you some time to consider my offer, but time is something we are running short on. Do you wish to stay here and face their bigotry, or will you place your trust in me and help make our entire world a safer place?"

She thought about everything he was saying. Every day there were more and more stories about mutants doing horrible things, or at least the news reporting on them. It seemed as if every pundit on the twenty-four hour news channels, no matter which side of the political spectrum they were on, were calling for tighter control of mutants or claiming they were one of the greatest threats to America and the world. And of course there was her own school. Right after that mutant Apocalypse had tried to attack and was stopped, Mike Flischer had been outted as a mutant and he was practically run out of town. She hadn't been a part of it, but more than a few of her friends had.

"I guess I don't have much a choice," she said, a tear rolling down her cheek.

"There is always a choice child," he said, wiping the tear away with a gloved thumb. "I realize how much you have lost in the last few days, and though we can never replace your parents, Avalon's Brotherhood will endeavor to be family to you."

"Avalon?" she asked as he led her towards the metal sphere behind him. With a wave of his hand the metal parted, revealing seats inside.

"There is much to explain," he said waving her in before him. "We shall share our stories on our journey," he joined her, the sphere closing behind him.

With a rush to her stomach she felt the sphere lift into the air and the next step of her life began, though not one she had ever planned.

-------------

After a stop at the hotel she and her parents had stayed at to gather her belongings, the journey to Avalon took just over an hour, during which Magneto told Suzie some of his story that had led him to create the island refuge. She was shocked to learn just how old he really was, but knowing his past made her understand exactly why he worked so hard now for mutant freedom. She in turn explained a bit about her life, her hopes and dreams, but mostly on the parents she had so recently lost. She had felt a kinship with the man who had rescued her as he told her about losing his own parents to the horrors of the concentration camps. His kind words of condolences had helped some, though that aching loss was still there.

When she felt the sphere slowing down, he gave her a smile. "We are here. Would you like to see the city from above?" She nodded and with a wave of his hand the metal opening slid open once again.

They were hovering high above a large island, but she could see the ocean shimmering all around it as the sun began setting in the distance. On one side of the island, near a range of mountains stood a city, complete with towering metal skyscrapers. Each building had a different design, each more beautiful than the last, and together they made the city seem like something out of a science fiction or fantasy story, where aesthetics were more important than the feasibility of the actual creation. Some were constructed using various sharp angles, others with sweeping arches and some even seemed to twist on an axis as they rose into the air. Each and every one of them though was unique and so vastly different than the plain designs of every other city she had seen. Surrounding the city was a wide harbor on one side, forests and parks on another. Towards the other side of the island she could see fields of crops and the occasional cottage. It was a truly breathtaking sight to behold.

She turned back to him as they slowly drifted down towards the city. "You created all of this?"

"I cannot take credit for everything of course. A building framework I can make easily, but the wonderful glassworks elude me. Creating the forests and fields are as well out of my domain. Many mutants have contributed with their gifts to create our homeland."

"It's absolutely beautiful. And you did all this in such a short time?"

"Some is work I have been doing sporadically for several years. Most of it though is quite new. This is what mutantkind can offer the world. I can shape metal into shapes and designs that would be nearly impossible for modern builders. Others have created a virtual Garden of Eden on a once barren piece of rock. Living in this city are those who can heal diseases, whose intelligence could leap our planet's technological levels beyond what we can even imagine, people who could rescue those in trouble, who could help feed the hungry and bring about peace. But humanity refuses to embrace the future that mutants can bring about. Instead they fear us because we change the status quo. We are different and our existence threatens their chokeholds on wealth and power in the world. We would take away their ability to exploit those who want and need, and thus we are made into the enemy. We are used as scapegoats for all the world's problems and they rile the masses into fervor against us."

"Not everyone is like that, are they?" she asked quietly.

"Of course not, my young friend. From what you have told me, I have no doubt your parents would have lovingly accepted you as a mutant. Sadly though there are many here on Avalon who have joined us because their families rejected them. And for every human who is tolerant of mutants, there is at least one who is not. I do believe that the day will come when we will not need Avalon, but until then she will serve as sanctuary to all mutants; a home for us to develop as a people and a fortress to defend us if ever the need arises."

"You've got to be making some people nervous, gathering up mutants like this," she said as the sphere touched down on a platform jutting out from the side of an all metal building. There she could see a woman waiting for them.

"Yes, there are those who fear any gathering of mutants, but in many ways it is the only way for us to survive. Aside from having those mutants with powers that lend themselves to defense protecting those who are not gifted in such a way, being together allows us to move beyond existing as just the outcasts of society. Here we have the opportunity to show the world we are not just the next genetic step in evolution, but the next social and cultural step as well."

Magneto assisted her in climbing down from the sphere before floating down beside her. Together they walked across the landing platform to meet the woman. She stood statuesque in a dark leather jumpsuit that opened from the neck to mid-chest, drawing even Suzie's eye to her ample cleavage. She wore dark hair in a loose bun tied up behind her head, showing off a long neck. Her exposed skin was porcelain white, marred only by twin scars under each eye. As they approached, she pulled a small clipboard from a sleek messenger bag she wore slung over her shoulder and handed it to Magneto. He glanced over it, at the faintest hint of a frown appeared on his face. "This is the most recent report?"

"Of course," she said.

"Very well. Suzanne, I'd like you to meet one of my lieutenants, Sage. Sage, this is our latest arrival Suzanne Chan."

"Welcome to Avalon Suzanne," Sage said with a nod.

"Thank you."

Magneto gave a smile. "One of Sage's considerable talents is the ability to discover the potential abilities of mutants. Since you do not yet understand the exact nature of your powers, her assistance will be invaluable to you. For now though, Sage, if you could merely show our new friend a place she can stay, it has been a rather long day."

"Quarters are ready for her."

"Excellent." Magneto turned to Suzie. "It has truly been a pleasure meeting you Suzanne and I thank you joining us here. I'll be in to check on you in a few days. If you'll excuse me though, I have some other matters to attend to."

"Thank you," she replied, "for everything."

"You are very welcome my dear." With that, Magneto rose into the air inside a faintly visible bubble of air distortion around him and rose to a small doorway that was sliding open near the top of the tower.

"You'll have to excuse him for that as well, Magneto does favor the dramatic in all he does," Sage said with the hint of a smile. She picked up one of the bags Suzie had and Suzie grabbed the other. Together they made their way to the doorway that was off the landing platform. On the other side was an elevator. Sage pushed a button for the ground floor and the doors slid shut with a hiss. "The building we are in now houses both the operations and communication systems for the island, but also the training facilities for the Acolytes."

"The Acolytes?"

"Yes. They are the defense force of Avalon. We also teach self defense courses for the general population if you are interested." The elevator slid open and they were standing outside in a beautifully landscaped courtyard with stone pathways that ran to the variety of buildings surrounding it. Through trees and the buildings she could see further paths that lead to larger, street like corridors. Sage led her across this first courtyard to a building that looked to be made out one complete piece of giant stone rather than individual components. All along the height of the tower were window niches filled with panes of glass held in place by elaborate metal frames. At the base of the tower stood two large glass doors in the same style as the windows. Sage opened one of these doors and held it open for Suzie.

"This is Camelot Tower, one of the primary domicile structures of the city. Many of the citizens live here, though they are beginning to branch out through out the city and into some of the smaller homes outside as well." They came to another elevator, which Sage called with a button, and after another ride they came to a long hallway with only a few doors. She led Suzie to one door near the far end of the hall and handed her a key. "This is your apartment and your key. Please be sure not to lose it." She gestured to the door. "After you."

"I'm surprised there aren't magnetic locks," Suzie said, putting the metal key into the lock and turning.

"We tried that originally. However, one of the defenses Magneto has set up is a permanent change to the magnetic field around the island to help shield us from various satellite based tracking systems in orbit. It unfortunately sometimes demagnetizes key cards."

Suzie barely heard a word Sage had said; she was too busy being mesmerized by her new living space. The main room to the apartment was absolutely huge, at least twice the size of the ground floor of her parents' house. It had an elegantly designed kitchen with a full set of appliances, a well furnished living room area, and a window that stretched the entire length of the far walls. Past the kitchen was an open door that led to bedroom that was simply furnished but left nothing to want.

"This is all for me?"

"Yes. You are only the three hundred forty seventh mutant brought to Avalon, so there is still plenty of space to spare." She moved to a phone that was set into the wall near the door. "If you need anything, dial zero and someone will be available to assist you. I have asked your next door neighbor to help show you around the island and answer any questions you might have. She is currently assisting in an off island matter, but should be returning late this evening. She will come by in the morning. I will return in two days and we shall begin our examination of your abilities. Is there anything else I can assist you with before I leave you?"

"How long will the examination take?"

"A cursory scan should only take a few minutes, but it will take several hours to find your full potential. From there it will take considerable training on your part to master your abilities."

"Do you have time now to at least to the quick version? My powers saved my life a few times now, but I have no idea how or even what I did."

"Very well, sit," she said, gesturing to one of the sofas. Suzie sat down and Sage pulled a chair from the dining table and placed it in front of the girl. She then slipped a small device from her bag and held it up. "I'm going to use this to analyze a drop of your blood. As that happens, I want you to explain to me what phenomenon you've noticed regarding your abilities. Between the blood analysis, your description and my own mental scans, I should be able to extrapolate a theory on your abilities. Please give me your hand." Suzie did so. "This will pinch."

Suzie felt a small prick on her thumb. Immediately strings of data began streaming rapidly on the screen of the device. "How can you understand that?"

"My abilities allow my brain to function at peak efficiency. I am able to both store and compute data faster than any computer I've ever encountered, as well as focus on multiple tasks. Please, explain your abilities."

Suzie began speaking about the shooting, and her later return to the scene. She went over both how she had seen the ghostly images as well as what she noticed about the bullets that had been shot at her. Finally she told Sage everything she could remember about the fight with the gang members, and at Sage's prompting she told about what she had been thinking each time some part of her power manifested. All the while, Sage kept her eyes focused on the screen and its constant stream of what looked to Suzie to be gibberish.

Not long after she finished speaking, Suzie saw that the screen display its last bit of information and Sage looked up. "Fascinating. I thought at first it was a combination of telepathy and telekinesis, but it would appear that I was wrong. Instead, I believe you possess limited time manipulation abilities."

"So I can stop time?" she said, her eyes wide in astonishment.

"Until we can explore your abilities in more detail, I will say yes. But it appears only in small, localized areas. Or perhaps you can only affect the flow of time for individual objects. Again, we would need to experiment. You also seem to be able to create exact visualizations of past events, though again the extent of which is unknown. You may only be able to view events from your own timeline, or if you are physically present in the area where the events occurred."

"I... wow."

"Indeed." Sage slipped the device back into her bag and returned the chair. "It's been a long day for you. You should get some rest."

"Yeah, and thanks for everything."

"You're welcome. I will be by when you've settled in and we will discover more about your abilities. Goodnight."

"Goodnight," Suzie said as Sage left.

She was still for a while, trying to absorb everything that had happened to her today and the days before when the dam broke and she burst into tears. She cried over the loss of her parents, her life being turned upside down by finding out she was a mutant, and being alone in a strange place with hardly anything from her old life. She cried until finally she fell asleep.

-------------

The next morning, Suzie stepped from the shower to the sound of knocking on her front door. Wrapping a towel around her torso, she moved to see who was there when she heard the front door open. "Hello? Suzanne?" called out the voice of a young woman. Suzie gave a frown at the intrusion and walked out into the main room.

"I'm right here. Why are you—whoa!" She stopped dead in her tracks as she rounded the corner into the living room. Standing in the middle of the room holding a cardboard box was a girl with lilac skin. She was wearing a long green dress, but it was cut in a way to show all of her arms and most of her legs, all of which were lilac. Her face was lilac though she did have some markings around her eyes that were a darker shade, and her solid eyes were a pale, milky green without any irises or pupils. Her hair, which matched the shade of the markings on her face, was pulled back, revealing two long pointed ears that made her look like an elf.

The girl smirked at Suzie. "Done?" Her voice had an amused tone to it, though there was a hint of annoyance.

"I, sorry, it's just--,"

"I know, pretty shocking the first time you see me. I don't blame you. I mean, you should have seen me the first time I saw it, I totally freaked out." She put down the box and moved to Suzie, giving the wet girl a quick hug. "I'm Blink by the way, I live across the hall. Sage asked me to show you around."

Suzie stumbled to recover from being hugged by this new girl. "Oh, um, hi. I mean, nice to meet you Blink, I'm Suzie."

"I know, welcome the Avalon. I brought you a few housewarming gifts." She motioned to the box. "Go ahead, open it."

Suzie gave the other girl a skeptical look, but reached down to open the lid. Inside was the last thing she expected to see. Pulling out a framed photo from the top of a stack of assorted things, she gasped as she saw it was a photo of her and her parents taken on vacation the previous summer. She turned her gaze back to Blink. "This is..."

"...Most of the things from your parent's place," Blink grinned. She waved her hand towards the still open door, and Suzie saw stacks of boxes outside in the hallway. "I had my team leave most of the big stuff like the furniture, but if there's anything you really want we can go back and get it, though probably not until tomorrow. A trip this big took a lot out of me."

"But, what, how? How did you get all of this here?" Suzie asked.

Blink gave another smile and disappeared in a flash of light. As the other girl vanished, Suzie heard a very distinct "BLINK" sound, followed by an echo behind her. Something nudged her shoulder and she jumped. Spinning around, she could see Blink chuckling to herself. "That never gets old. I can teleport. Myself, other people, things, you name it. Makes moving pretty easy."

"I'll bet!"

"Why don't you get changed and you can give me a hand with all this," Blink said, heading to the door to grab another box from the hall.

"Sure!" Suzie ran back into her bedroom. She dried herself off as best as she quickly could, ignoring her wet hair, and threw on some clothes. Blink had moved another two boxes in before Suzie joined her in the hallway. Between the two of them they managed to get all the boxes into the apartment and stacked off to one side. It would take a while to sort all of it out, but already Suzie was feeling better knowing she hadn't lost everything after fleeing to Avalon.

"Thank you, for getting all of this for me Blink. I don't know what... it's been so..." she could feel the tears welling up again.

"Hey it's okay," Blink said, wrapping her arms around her new neighbor and pulling her close, her hand gently rubbing Suzie's back. "I know what it's like having everything change so quickly. You'll be okay."

Suzie sniffed and wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt. "Did you lose your parents too?"

"Pretty much," Blink said, a look of anger creasing her face. "Sadly they're still alive though. They kicked me out when they found out I was a mutant."

"That's horrible!"

"Yeah. I knew my parents were pretty crappy people, so when I learned I could teleport I hid it. But then I look started to change physically and that was the end of that. 'Ported out of there before dear old Dad could get the shotgun when he and Mom found out."

"You can't be serious!"

"They're fanatics. I'm an abomination against God, spawn of Satan, all that garbage. They would have fit right in with an old time witch hunt. I hated everything they believed even before I found out I was a mutant, so it just sped up me leaving I guess. And it made it easier to get out too. Still, I had hoped maybe at least they wouldn't hate me."

"Where did you go?"

"I lived on the streets for a little while. Well, not really the streets. I used to teleport into empty hotel rooms and stay the night. Pretty nice ones too." She reached into a bag she wore at her side and pulled out a thin shard of what looked like crystal. "Right after I figured out how to teleport I figured out how to make these. Just think about where I want something to go as I throw it, and whatever I hit teleports. So I could snatch food, money, whatever I needed easily. Eventually Magneto found me and brought me here."

"I'm so sorry," Suzie said softly.

Blink looked like she might say any number of things, but settled on "Thanks," after a pause.

Suzie was the one to start their third hug. Blink might have had a very different life than her, but Suzie felt that there already was a sort of kinship between them due to what they both had lost in life. It would make this new life easier to deal with. She also felt something else that thankfully distracted both of them.

"Oh my God, your skin is so smooth! Is that part of your mutation?"

"Nope," Blink said with a laugh as she sat on the couch. "I just have really good moisturizer. I'll get you some next time on the mainland."

"You go there often? Magneto made this place sound completely self sufficient."

"Oh, sure. Food, water, power, we've got plenty of that. Quality moisturizer? I don't think so. Plus I get sent out for a lot of different things. Magneto say I'm the most accomplished teleporter he's ever seen, since I can go pretty much anywhere, anytime, though a lot of long distance trips in a row wear me out quick. Sometimes I get sent to pick up different supplies or sometimes I go bring new mutants in if Magneto's too busy to do it personally. I usually take requests from people who need things."

"So you're like the black market hookup? Glad I have you for a neighbor."

"Kind of. There's no money or anything on Avalon. Most people just owe me favor. And it's not like I'm going that far out of my way so it's no big."

"In that case I gladly take you up on your offer of great moisturizer. Maybe I can cook dinner or something for us sometimes."

"Perfect! I can't cook at all." She glanced over at a clock on the wall and stood. "Up for a tour?"

-------------

The tour lasted a few hours. It wasn't much of a tour really, mostly Blink just pointing interesting places as they walked around and got to know one another. Suzie was happy to find out that until Blink had run away from home her life had been similar to hers. She had dabbled in music, but had focused most of her time in the theater with hopes of going on to being a professional stage actress. They had shared a laugh when Blink said that Magneto was interested to see if she would produce some of the first mutant pieces of drama.

"He's really big on the idea of making our own society, isn't he?" Suzie asked in awe.

"Yeah, kind of silly really. I mean, I can get doing something on mutant related topics, like a Mutant Blues or something, but building a whole new mutant way of acting or making music? I'm not even sure how you would do that."

"Seriously, I'll stick with my Dazzler albums," Suzie said. Blink just started laughing. "What, Dazzler is good!"

Blink shook her head and got her giggles under control. "Dazzler totally rocks. But it's funny because Alison Blaire is a mutant."

"What! No way!"

"Oh yeah. That whole light show in her act is her power."

"How do you know this? Wouldn't it be all over the news?"

"I met her once and we talked a while. And it's probably been in a tabloid or two but after that whole 'Angelina Jolie is a mutant' thing blew up in their faces no one really pays attention anymore. Not that Allie really cares if people find out. She'd still sell a gazillion albums. She's just not announcing it on stage."

There was a lull in the conversation here, and Suzie decided to as the question that had been on her mind since she first met Magneto. "Blink, is this place really everything he says it is? A utopia and all that?"

Blink frowned at this. "Right now maybe. But I don't think it'll always be that way. The more mutants that come here, the more likely we're going to start getting some bad seeds, you know?"

"Yeah. But what about Magneto? I mean, they call him a terrorist. Even if most of it's just the news blowing things out of proportion, some of it has to be true. Are we just supposed to be an army for him?"

"No, it's not like that. He calls us the Brotherhood to get us to feel united, not because we're some terrorist group or something. But he's not stupid, he knows that sooner or later some human out there is going to try something, and Magneto's getting ready for that. You know about the Acolytes, right?"

Suzie nodded. "Yeah, Sage mentioned them yesterday. Something about a police force or something."

"Something like that. They're the ones who can fight. There's this girl, Ceres, she grows a lot of the food for the island. Plant powers. Maybe she could figure out a way to defend herself with that, but she's probably not going to do much against a Sentinel. Plus she's the sweetest thing you've ever met, wouldn't hurt a fly. Someone needs to defend people like her. The Acolytes are the protectors."

"Are you one?" Suzie asked.

"Working on it. I'm a pretty good martial artist, but my powers make a good support for a team. Plus I can get a little creative. It's hard for a Sentinel to fight if you teleport it to the Moon."

Suzie couldn't help but laugh at the silly grin on Blink's face. "Can you really teleport something that far?"

"I dunno, maybe. Even if I only get it part of the way there it wouldn't be around here anymore."

"So you believe in Magneto then?"

Blink stopped at looked out towards the sea. They had come to a path that walked along the edge of a small cliff with a beach below them. She leaned against the railing of the walkway as she thought. "I believe in Avalon, and keeping the mutants who come here safe. If Magneto came to me and said we were going to start attacking the humans, I doubt I'd go along with it. But keeping everyone safe from people who want to kill us for being different? Who would attack our home? I'll fight for that."

Suzie couldn't help but think about her parents. If she had known about her powers, there's no doubt she would have used them to defend her parents from any attack. "I think I would too," she said at last.

"You know," Blink said, turning back to her and letting a familiar smile cross her face again, "I don't think I even asked what you can do."

"I can stop time, according to Sage. We haven't really tested it out much though."

"Stop time?! That's awesome!" Blink's excitement was infectious as she gripped Suzie's arm. "Well go on, let's see it!"

"How do you know I haven't already stopped it a few times to go wander off a bit?" she asked with a smirk.

Blink opened her mouth to say something, then stopped and snapped her mouth shut into a pout. Finally she said, "I guess you could have. Did you really? Or are you just messing with me?"

"Just messing with you. I don't even know how to yet. It's just sort of happened when I needed it to so far."

"Huh," Blink thought a bit. "How about just squinch up your face and making it happen?"

"Making it happen? That's your answer?"

"Worked for me at first. Of course, I started teleporting to all sorts of random places when I wasn't focusing on something in particular."

"Right. Okay, stand back just in case." Blink complied by teleporting thirty feet away and flashing a grin. "Smartass," Suzie rolled her eyes.

She took a deep breath, closed her eyes and concentrated. 'Stop time,' she said to herself as she felt her face contort. She gave it about thirty seconds before she opened one eye to look around. "Did I do it?"

With a ring Blink teleported back to Suzie. "Nope, you did make a great looking face though."

"So happy to have amused you," Suzie answered. She let out a sigh. "I hope Sage has better ideas than 'just make it happen.'"

Blink nudged her friend. Suzie looked up to see the other girl standing with her mouth open in shock. She nudged again and pointed. There, right next to the outstretched finger was a fly, perfectly frozen in the air. "That's so cool."

Feeling overjoyed that her mutant power worked when she actually wanted it to, Suzie let out a laugh and threw a fist into the air. "Oh yeah, I rule. And if those humans attack us one fly at a time, I'll show them!"

Blink joined in her laughter and gave her a hug. "Better than nothing right?"

Suzie grinned. "Right!"

Farther down the path they could hear voices coming towards them, and a large group rounded a bend about a hundred yards away. "Oh crap," Blink muttered.

"What is it, who are they?" Suzie asked. As far as she could tell it was just a group of kids about their age.

"That's the Brotherhood. They're Acolytes, and a pain in the ass."

"Wait, I thought we were all supposed to be the Brotherhood."

Blink shook her head. "Different Brotherhood. Magneto got most of them together a few years ago in some place called Bayville. They walk around this place like they own it now. You're probably going to run into them so best you know them. The tall cute one is Lance. Decent enough guy but a temper. The giant guy is Freddie. They call him the Blob, guess why. Sweet guy if you're alone with him, a jerk when the others are around. Can get a bit obsessive though so be careful. The toady looking one is Toad. Most disgusting thing you'll ever meet. The other cute one is Mimic, he's one of the better ones. The goth girl is Wanda, Magneto's daughter. She's crazy, watch out for her. The brunette is Cassandra, don't trust her. And the white haired guy is Magneto's son, Pietro."

By the time Blink had finished saying his name, Pietro had appeared in a blur with his arm wrapped around the lilac girl. "Blink baby, talking about me again. Can't blame you," he said, speaking in a rapid voice.

Blink rolled her eyes, something that accomplished little since it was so hard to see her eyes moving without irises. "As I was saying Suzie, Quicksilver here thinks he's God's gift to women."

"What can I say, I'm cute, super fast and all around great guy. I really can't help it if I'm everything a lady would want."

By this time the others had come close enough for them all to hear. Suzie could see both Wanda and Cassandra rolling their eyes along with Blink at Pietro. Blink turned back to Suzie. "The worst part about it is that he's absolutely right."

Suzie had known of Pietro for less than a minute and already thought he was full of crap, so she missed the humorous site of every single one of the Brotherhood's mouths, including Pietro's, dropping open in synchronized shock because she was too busy doing so herself.

The speedster seemed to recover first. "You really think, I mean, well, yeah!" he said with a stuttered start.

"God damn it Pietro, I hate how much I'm attracted to you. It isn't right," Blink said with a frustrated sigh.

"I think I'm going to throw up," Wanda muttered loud enough for everyone to hear.

"Right there with you," Cassandra added.

"It's okay, really," Pietro said, each moment gaining more of his swagger back. "I'm into you just as bad sweet thing."

"Really?" Blink asked with almost child like awe. She turned slightly into the arm he had around her shoulder to square herself up to him, letting her body press tightly against him.

"Oh yeah, definitely," Pietro said, his voice sounding distant as he stared at the lithe girl rubbing again him. "The most."

"Good," Blink said. She reached a hand up to his face to pull it down to hers, causing the Brotherhood girls to turn away in disgust. Suzie couldn't turn away, like watching a horrendous train wreck. But just as Blink's lips were half an inch away from Pietro's he disappeared in a flash of bright violet light. Below them there was a splash in the waves and a shocked cry.

"Oh thank God," Cassandra said, her eyes peaking out from between her fingers.

"Did you have to let that go on for so long?" Wanda asked.

Blink just shrugged with a smirk and jointed the rest of the guys laughing and watching Pietro struggle in the surf below. Finally the white haired teen found some footing and with a giant splash of displaced water ran his way back up to the others. "I take it you're really not that into me then?" he said with a grimace, sea water dripping off his long bangs.

"Wow, you really are quick," Blink said as she turned to lean her back against the railing.

"You'll change your mind eventually, don't worry," he scoffed and turned his attention to Suzie. "And who is your beautiful new friend? Always liked Asian girls."

"I'm Suzie," she answered, trying to come up with her own way to throw off his attention.

"Suzie huh? And what do you do that brings you to Avalon?"

"She slows down time," Blink answered for her. "Wonder how much effort it would take her to slow you down to normal speed."

"Seriously?" he asked, glancing fearfully back and forth between the two of them.

Blink answered by pointing to the still frozen fly, stuck in mid wing flap. The others looked on with various noises of approval of the new girl's power, while Pietro audibly gulped. Suzie watched in disgust though as the one called Toad snatched the fly out of the air with a long, slimy tongue and ate it.

"Huh, doesn't taste like anything," he said with a confused look.

"That's because it was frozen in time. I don't even want to know what will happen when that wears off," Suzie said, averting her gaze from the smelly little creature.

"What! What do you mean? What's going to happen?" he began panicking. "Am I going to die? Aw man, it's going to kill me!" he screamed before hopping away to get who knows what sort of help.

"Well, you got rid of Toad with no problem, I think you'll do fine here," Wanda said with a smirk, giving Suzie a nod of approval.

"Anyways, I think we'll leave you ladies alone now, have a pleasant day," Pietro said before speeding off down the path a few yards. "Come on, let's get out of here!" he called back to the others before continuing on in not quite super speed, but definitely brisk pace.

The others trailed off after Pietro, though the one called Lance stopped and turned around. "Toad isn't really going to die, is he?"

Suzie shrugged. "Doubt it."

"Just wondering, no big deal. Welcome to Avalon," he said nonchalantly, moving to catch up with his friends.

Blink and Suzie waited until the other group had passed around another bend in the walkway before busting up laughing with each other.

-------------

The two young women finished touring the island in the early evening and retired back to Suzie's apartment where she cooked some dinner for the two of them. It was after they had finished eating and cleaning up that Blink had a question for Suzie.

"Do you think you'd ever join the Acolytes?"

"I don't know, I'm not much of a fighter. I think I'd like to help out though."

"You said you took some martial arts classes though, right?"

"Sure some self defense stuff to make Dad feel I was a little safer. I didn't have time to really get into it though. Do you really want me there?"

Blink smiled. "I would be nice to have a friend around instead of just the Brotherhood people. I mean, some of the people training now are all right too, but I dunno. We just click. Plus your powers could be a huge help. Imagine freezing a bomb in the air."

"Bomb?!" Suzie asked, sitting up wide eyed. "Who's going to bomb us? I thought it was supposed to be safe here!"

"Safe as anywhere will be. But you're a mutant now honey, no where is ever going to be really safe. There's always going to be some fanatic like my folks out there."

Suzie sighed. "I guess your right."

Blink stood and gave Suzie's shoulder a squeeze. "Think about it. You don't have to decide anything until after you figure out your powers anyways so you have plenty of time. And you can always change your mind."

She smiled up at her new friend. "Thank you Blink, for everything. I don't know if I would have made it so far without your help."

"You probably would have, but it wouldn't have been quite as fun." They laughed together as Suzie followed Blink to the door. "I'll see you tomorrow," the lilac mutant said with a smile.

"Goodnight Blink."

"Goodnight!"

And with that, Suzie was once again alone. She lingered at the closed door some before returning to the main room. She scooped up the leftover glasses she and Blink had been using and took them to the kitchen to wash them out. Tucking them away on a drying rack, she returned yet again to the living room. Her eyes found a large family portrait that she and Blink had hung over the fireplace, much the same way it had in her home back in California. "What do you think Mom and Dad?"

She wanted to help defend people, but she could shake the feeling that not everyone in the Acolytes had the same idea. The group she had met today seemed more like thugs who had found an outlet than people who genuinely cared. Even Magneto seemed a little too eager to take the fight to the humans and was just waiting for the right opportunity. She certainly didn't want to be a part of that. But Blink seemed to be doing it for the right reasons. She hated her parents, sure, but didn't seem to hold any prejudice against any other human.

Suzie paused in her thinking. It was getting easier to think of herself as something else rather than human. It disturbed her a bit. She was a mutant, yes, but she was still a human being. It was people thinking she and those like her weren't human that was causing all these problems to begin with. She would have to watch her thoughts about that to make sure she never lost sight of her own humanity.

She looked back to her parents. They had died in front of her, and while her powers had saved her, they hadn't saved her parents. She couldn't let that happen again. She didn't want to fight a war, but she didn't want to see anyone else get killed either. Maybe training and joining with the Acolytes was the best choice for her to find a way to make sure she never failed to help someone she might have been able to.

"Maybe I'll become Batman," she smiled at her parents. With a laugh at her own silliness, she went to get ready for bed.


	6. Chapter 6

**6**

"Are you sure Charles?" It was a Monday morning and Logan stood in Xavier's office, watching the driveway below through the large windows. "That little incident at the mall isn't exactly easing my mind about all this."

"Nor mine, but the fact remains that this has to happen at some point." Xavier wheeled his chair next to Logan, also watching his students prepare for school. "It took a great deal of work to convince Principal Kelly to allow this. I even had to go before the PTA and the school board to explain her situation, though a rather censored version of course. Thankfully, Kelly's anti-mutant biased worked to our advantage as I painted the picture of an abused girl who would benefit from further interaction with those her age in a normal school environment. His prejudice at wanting to stop that lost him some allies I believe. And while I was appealing to their sympathies, the fact remains that Laura is, in essence, just as I said."

"I still say it's too soon. Her temper—"

"Is in many ways at the same level as yours. She will be surrounded by her friends at all time, and they have proven to be remarkable restraints for her outbursts. They put her at ease and she has a strong desire to cause as few problems for them as possible."

"She hasn't had the same schooling as they have. Is she going to be ready?"

"Hank has repeatedly said she is an exemplary student. She certainly excels in some areas over others, but that is perfectly natural." A smile formed on the Professor's face. "Logan, you have to let them leave the nest eventually."

Logan shot Xavier a look before grunting at turning back to the window. Below Bobby had pulled the van around to the front of the house, and soon Kurt joined him. Logan missed what Bobby said, the driver door of the van slamming shut and covering it up, but he could hear the rest of the conversation through the open window.

"You can't be serious!"

"Come on Kurt, it's Wildthing's first day, don't you think she should get the full experience?"

"Ja, but vhy do the rest of us need to?"

"You're an X-Man Kurt," Bobby said, slapping a hand down on Kurt's shoulder. "Where's your sense of adventure?"

"Adventure, not suicide," Kurt muttered as a few of the other student started making their way outside.

"Hey 'Cat, catch!" Bobby said with a grin, tossing the van keys to her.

Kitty caught the keys and stared at them. "You can't be serious!"

"Why do people keep asking that? Yes, I'm serious. My knee hurts from the Danger Room yesterday and Kurt's coffee hasn't kicked in yet. Unless you're not up for it..."

Kitty pounced on him from the top of the steps, slamming a kiss onto his lips as her arms wrapped around his neck. Her momentum swung both of them around until she landed at the bottom of the steps. "You're the best Icee!" she squeed when she broke the kiss, her smile lighting up her entire face. She let go of him and turned to the others. "Let's go people! Time's a wastin!"

The other students glared at Bobby as Kitty ran to the van. It roared to life as the engine revved a few times. "You heard the nice lady, let's go children, off to school!" he said with a few claps of his hands, acting as if he were talking to first graders. The others grumbled and started to load into the van.

"Logan, Ah'm taking your bike!" Rogue called up, having noticed him watching the scene from the Professor's office. She didn't bother waiting for a reply, stalking off to the garage.

Bobby and Laura were the last ones to make their way down to the van. Tabitha had been trying all weekend to put together the perfect outfit for Laura's first day of school that would show her off, but the clone had resisted at every turn, insisting on wearing her normal t-shirt and jeans with boots. Finally to appease Tabby, and to get her to shut up, Laura had agreed to some concessions. She still wore jeans, but they were tighter than her normal choices. They still allowed for plenty of movement though, which was all that mattered to Laura. Instead of a t-shirt she was in a spaghetti strapped tank top, though she hadn't budged on it being black. She still had more skin exposed than she was used to, but actually found it slightly refreshing now that winter had ended and the temperature was on the rise again. Finally, Tabby had refused to let Laura wear her normal boots, which weren't much different than her uniform boots. Laura in turn refused to wear any sort of heel or platform shoe, and so they had settled on a pair of thong sandals. Tabitha declared her cute enough, but insisted Laura could be hotter if she wanted. Laura's only response was to roll her eyes and leave the room.

She turned to Bobby and waved a hand towards the other students getting into the van. "I don't understand what everyone is upset about. It's just a normal day of school, right?" she asked him.

"They're worried about Kitty's driving. She can get a bit... enthusiastic about it."

"Enthusiastic?" Laura asked with a glance to the girl. The look on Kitty's face through the windshield seemed to hold more maniacal glee than just mere enthusiasm as she gripped the steering wheel and bounced up and down in the driver's seat.

"I think she just plays it up a bit to get to people. I'm rubbing off on her," he said with a proud smile that he hoped was also reassuring. Laura quirked her mouth at him, shook her head and got into the back of the van. Bobby noticed the front seat was still open. "No one took shotgun?"

"We decided if anyone gets thrown from the car it should be you!" Tabitha yelled from the back.

"I'm not that bad!" Kitty yelled back to them. The only response for her was the clicking of seatbelts, the gripping of the seat backs in front of them, and one muttered "Hail Mary" in German.

Bobby hopped into the van and hadn't even finished closing the door before the van took off with a squeal of its tires. It occurred to Bobby that maybe this was a bad idea right around the time the van phased through the front gate going eighty.

Up in Xavier's office, Logan turned to the Professor. He didn't bother to say anything, choosing instead to glare.

"If she survives the trip to the school," Charles said with the hint of a smile, "the rest of the day should be quite easy."

-------------

The fifteen seat van skidded to a stop after a long power slide into a parallel parked position between another van and a truck along one side of the school.

"New record!" Kitty yelled, raising her fists into the air in victory. "This is going to be a great day!" She kissed her boyfriend on the cheek and threw the door open to leave, grabbing her book bag on the way out.

The silence in the van hung heavy in the air until a quiet voice spoke up from the back. "Zhank you for taking zhe Terror Taxi. Ve know you have many choices in school transportation, and you vere stupid enough to choose zhis one." Even with the image inducer, Kurt looked a little green.

"I'm really sorry guys," a pale Bobby said from the passenger seat.

"That was fun. She's driving us home too, right?" Laura asked. She grabbed her backpack and climbed over a few petrified bodies to the side doors of the van. The fresh air that filled the car when she popped them open woke everyone from their daze and they fell out of the van, shakily gathering their bags and heading towards the front entrance of the school.

As Bobby was leaving, a motorcycle roared up next to them. Rogue raised the visor on her helmet and surveyed the surprising lack of damage to the actual van, but the various states of disarray of its passengers made her laugh. "When you have a prank backfire on ya, it really backfires, doesn't it?" she asked as Bobby tried to put his backpack on.

"Yeah, it really does," his voice broke. Rogue laughed again, slammed the visor down and took off on Wolverine's bike to the other side of the parking lot.

Bobby locked up the van, took a deep breath in hopes of finally settling his stomach, and walked to where Kitty was waiting with Kurt, Alex, Dani and Laura. Kitty frowned at him. "Oh come on Iceman, it wasn't that bad."

"No, it kind of was," he said, slipping an arm over her shoulder and kissing her forehead.

Kitty rolled her eyes. "I've seen you take the jet into barrel rolls that should have ripped the wings off, all while you're laughing your ass off, but little old me driving to school gets you weak in the knees?"

"What can I say? You do funny things to me."

She rolled her eyes again, but did reach up to kiss him along his jawline.

As they reached the top of the steps to the school, the warning bell rang. Kitty gave Bobby another kiss and untangled herself from his arm. "Okay Laura, we already got your schedule for you and you're in all the same classes as these three so stick with them," she said with a wave of her finger towards Bobby, Alex and Dani. "And if Bobby pulls something, you have my permission to hurt him a little."

"I know," Laura answered.

"Just making sure," Kitty said, giving Laura a quick hug. "You're going to do fine, see you at lunch!" She kissed Bobby again to wipe the indignant look off his face before grabbing Kurt by the arm and dragging him off to class.

"She hugs a lot," Laura said with a frown after Kitty was out of earshot.

"I don't mind it much," Bobby said with a lopsided grin.

"Of course you don't bro," Alex said with a laugh, grasping Bobby around the shoulder. "Bobby loves his little Kitty hanging all over him."

"She just cares about you," Dani said, shaking her head at the boys, who were now in an impromptu close quarters shoving match, Alex making kissy noises at Bobby. "She sees you as a little sister."

"Why?" Laura asked, her eyebrows once again dropping in confusion.

"Kitty's just like that, she likes looking out for people," Bobby answered after finally hip checking Alex off of him. "Most of us are looking out for you," he said, hoping to diffuse the temper he could see growing in Laura.

Fail, he thought to himself as she whirled towards him and jabbed a finger into his chest. "I don't need people watching out for me, I can take care of myself."

"Ease up Wildthing!" he said, looking around to make sure Kelly didn't decide to show up at that moment. "We know you can handle yourself in a fight, or even just living out in the woods or whatever. But against everything in there," he pointed into the doors of the high school, "you need as much backup as you can get."

"You're kind of like me Laura, we missed things we shouldn't have," Dani said gently, placing a hand on the girl's arm. She tensed for a moment before relaxing under the Cheyenne girl's touch. "Everyone is just trying to make sure we get those chances now. It's not a bad thing."

Laura took a deep breath and let it out. "Sorry. I'm still not used to all of this."

"You'll get it some day," Alex said. "But we better get to class now."

-------------

When classes broke for lunch, Bobby and Alex left to go find Kurt to "help set something up," while Dani had gone ahead to the cafeteria to meet Kitty. Laura had left her lunch in her locker and told Dani she would meet her later. After retrieving her food and finding her way to the lunch room, Laura stood in the doorway and tried to let her senses adjust to the crowded room. As with every other time she had been in the halls today, it took her a few moments to get used to the noise. The smells were even worse. She had heard Logan complain from time to time about being around so many hormonal teenagers at once in the Institute, but clearly he hadn't spent much time in the high school. The smells were so overwhelming she was surprised that even the humans without advanced smell couldn't pick up on everything people's scents were screaming out.

Kitty had spotted her from across the room and was waving like an idiot to her. Laura smirked. She liked Kitty, but the girl could be ridiculously excitable at times. She pulled on the strap of her backpack to secure it better and made her way across the room. She passed a table full of muscular boys in matching jackets and she could both feel a few of their eyes roaming up and down her body as she passed, and could smell their base approval of her form in their scents even if they didn't know they were putting it out. Part of her was telling her instinctually to jump on one of the taller, dark haired boys who reminded her vaguely of Piotr and have her way with him. She had read plenty on human sexuality during her study periods at the Institute and was beginning to understand these strange urges she found herself ignoring now that she was regularly around other people. Logan had warned her that due to their nature, part of her would always feel animalistic instincts and that she should try her best to resist them. Of course, due to those instincts a different part of her wanted to jump on the same boy and gut him with her claws for daring to look at her. She smirked to herself at that. She was a lioness after all. No matter what her small size would convey, she was not some petite little rabbit that rolled over just for anyone.

She reached Kitty's table and sat down in the seat the girl had saved for her between herself and Dani. Amanda sat on the other side of Kitty. "How's your first day going?" Kitty asked before taking a bite of her sandwich.

Laura began unpacking her own food and shrugged. "Okay, I guess. I don't have much to base it on."

"What was your old school like?" one of Kitty's friends asked.

"I didn't go to school. Who are you?"

Kitty quickly swallowed. "Oh, sorry Laura. This is Tiffani, Susan, Beth and Megan, but Megan's so quiet you probably will forget she's here," Kitty said, over the protests coming from Megan. "Girls, this is Laura. She just started today."

"Do you live up at the Institute too? Are you a, you know..." the one called Beth asked, waving her hand vaguely as her voice trailed off.

"Mutant?" Laura answered, eyebrow raised and voice steady. "Yes."

"What can you do?" Susan asked. Laura's eyes narrowed just slightly, but the girl picked up on it. "If you don't mind, that is. Kitty tells us a lot, but not everything."

Laura turned her gaze to Kitty. "I don't think you should be talking about the Institute."

"The Professor doesn't mind, I asked him," Kitty answered. "He doesn't want to keep a lot of things a secret. He wants people to understand us more and not be so scared all the time."

Laura kept her eyes on Kitty for a moment before speaking again. "I heal fast," she said, turning back to Susan. "I also have heightened senses and claws, but I'm supposed to keep them hidden at school."

"You sound like Mr. Logan," Susan said. "Kitty's told us about him. Are you related?"

"I... it's complicated."

"Complicated like never having gone to school before?" Tiffani, the girl who had originally asked about previous schools asked again.

Everyone had warned Laura she might be pestered with questions like this, being the new girl and from the Institute. Lunch was so far the first free time anyone had to really ask them, since their classes had been too busy earlier for people to approach her. She decided to just say as much as she could to stave off further questions.

"Logan's DNA was stolen from a government project known as Weapon X by the criminal organization Hydra. They wanted to clone him and reproduce the procedures Weapon X had performed to make him into a living weapon. I'm the twenty third attempt to clone him, and the only one that survived. They trained me to be a thief, assassin, whatever else they needed while mentally conditioning me to be a mindless tool, but I eventually broke out and destroyed them. Logan found me and brought me back to the Institute and with Professor Xavier's help I've been learning how to function in society. So far I'd say it's been moderately successful."

The four new girls stared at her at shock, while Kitty, Dani and Amanda continued to eat unfazed by Laura's history, having heard it many times before. Laura had finished half her sandwich before Tiffani choked out, "Are you serious?"

Laura shrugged. "I said it was complicated."

They looked to Kitty.

"What? You know I have a weird life. Laura's one of the weirder parts. She's cool though, just realize she doesn't get shoe shopping and probably never will and we'll be fine."

"Don't talk to me about shoe shopping," Laura said, shaking her head. Just the mention of it though seemed to summon the sometimes bane of Laura's existence as Tabitha bounced over, Amara right behind her.

"Laura, check out the football team checking you out. Nice work girl!"

"I don't care if they're checking me out."

"Psh, you should, there's some fine pieces of man meat on the team this year. Not too bright, but who expects that right? Speaking of not too bright, where's your boy toy Kitty?"

"You know, I don't know. He should have found Kurt by now. What did you need him for?" Kitty asked.

"Nothing much, just wanted to get on his case about letting you drive this morning."

"I'm not that bad!" Kitty protested loudly while her friends snickered behind her back.

"Whatever, I'll just find him later. Bye ladies! Be nice to my girl Laura okay? She can always use more friends." It was said in Tabby's typically brash way, but everyone could tell she really did care about what happened to Laura and the girl was oddly touched by it. Or the sandwich wasn't settling right, she still wasn't used to identifying emotions.

"Sorry about her," Amara said, grabbing Tabby's arm and pulling her away. "She's off her meds today."

Tabby's protests were soon lost in the racket of the crowded lunch room, and the other girls turned back to Laura. She sighed to herself, hoping something would come along and draw attention off of her for longer than Tabby's Laura-centered interruption.

-------------

On the other side of the cafeteria, a small group of mutants gathered in one of the back doorways to the room, looking into the mass of students.

"You ready for zhis?"

"Of course dude."

"You know, it's so much easier now that I'm sitting here watching you go through this."

"Shut up Bobby."

"Vhen do you vant me to start zhe music?"

"What music?"

"You're singing zhe song right?"

"Dude, that was joke idea when Bobby was asking Kitty out! I'm not going to that!"

"Vhat?! Zhat is zhe second time I've hooked up to zhe caf's speakers! Someone needs to sing one of zhese times."

"Maybe you should just sing to Amanda if you're that worried about it."

"Shut up Bobby, I'm not zhat crazy."

"Would you two both shut up? There's enough pressure as it is."

"I thought you had this all worked out. What happened to, 'No worries dude, it's gunna be like totally righteously sweet, just you watch broham. Like, cowabunga narlyness and radical killer waves, hang ten brah!' Don't tell me you're chickening out."

"First dude, I don't sound like that. Second, I'm just working out the right things to say to impress everyone. Gotta top that lame rose thing you did."

"That was the smoothest thing anyone has ever done, ever. And it totally worked, didn't it?"

"Yeah, which means I need to show these ladies what smooth really is. They've had to put up with second rate for far too long."

"Just go already. At zhis rate lunch vill end before you say anyzhing."

"Right, okay, I'm going in. Time for you too see what real cool is Iceman."

"Yeah, right. Good luck Blondie."

"Gott speed mein freund!"

"Hey guys, what's happening?"

"Hey Ray, Alex is going to ask Dani out."

"Ohhh, this should be good."

Alex could hear Ray and Roberto joining in to the whispered conversation as he made his way across the cafeteria. He remembered Bobby saying how nervous he was when he had made the walk months ago. Alex could help but smirk to himself about that, but quickly wiped it from his face before anyone could see it. It wasn't about smooth lines or cheesy props made of ice, it was about confidence. The confidence it took to stand up on a monster twelve footer was the same confidence needed to walk across the cafeteria and ask out a smoking hottie. He'd already done the hard work. True, Dani was one of the hottest girls at school, in any grade, but he'd already won her attention. Despite her being a mutant there were plenty of people still interested in her. Unfortunately for them, Alex had an admittedly unfair advantage over them by living with her at the Institute. Now all he had to do was make it official and he was in.

Not that he was looking at her as just some prize to win before the other guys. Like he had told Bobby, he was already totally into the girl. They had genuinely clicked in their time living in the Institute together and he enjoyed spending time with her more than anyone else

He sauntered up to the table Dani and Kitty's group was sitting at. Aside from the new addition of Laura, all the girls there were a combination of book smarts and fashion obsession, creating a group of rare, semi-popular nerds. That they were all attractive certainly helped them shake most of the nerd stigma. Amanda was the one who spotted Alex first and nudged Dani in the shoulder. The Cheyenne turned around at gave Alex a grin, though he could just barely make out the blush under her darker skin. "Hey Alex," she said, and it was soon chorused by the rest of the girls at the table, who aside from Kitty, Laura and Amanda, were looking at him the same way Dani was.

"Hi Dani, hello ladies," he returned the grin, his eyes quickly sweeping the table to acknowledge all the other girls but settling on Dani to make her know her was focused on her.

"Where's everyone else?" Dani asked, not seeing the usual gang of Kurt and Bobby.

"Skulking in the corner of there," he replied, tossing his head back lazily instead of pointing with his hand. That his long hair gave a little toss was just an added bonus.

Amanda and Dani glanced that direction, while Kitty merely sighed and turned back to her lunch. "What's my boyfriend up to now?" she asked with resigned dread.

"Nothing bad this time," he tried to reassure Kitty, "they're just waiting to see if I'm going to fall on my face."

"Doing what?" Dani asked with a confused look.

"This," he said with a smile. He took hold of her hand as he squatted down beside her. "Danielle Moonstar, you are one of the most incredible women I have ever met. You're smart, funny, caring, stunningly beautiful, and most importantly you're the one of the few things keeping me sane while I'm away from home. Would you please..."

Alex didn't actually finish what he had planned to say because Dani had launched herself of her seat and firmly attached herself to his lips with her own, causing Alex to fall back onto floor of the cafeteria with Dani on top of him. Around them were some cheers and wolf whistles, though plenty of disappointed remarks as there had been quite a few people with their hopes set on one of the two of them.

On the other side of the room, Kurt patted Bobby on the back. "Guess he showed you how to do it. He's definitely cooler zhan you mein freund." He left to go join his own girlfriend.

"He is not!" Bobby yelled out.

-------------

The rest of lunch passed without much fanfare for most of the group. Dani spent the rest of the meal molded to Alex's side, Kitty spent the time reassuring Bobby that he was still cool and how his asking her out meant the world to her, the four human girls of the group pestered Alex and Dani, and Laura was able to enjoy the rest of the meal observing the others without any questions directed at her. However, there was one whispered conversation between Amanda and Kurt that was fairly extraordinary.

"I can't believe I'm meeting vith your parents tonight," Kurt said softly.

"I'm pretty sure my dad knows it's you," Amanda said, a touch of nervousness in her voice.

"Vhat? How do you know?"

"When I told him I wanted to bring my new boyfriend to dinner for them to meet tonight, he gave me this look. My mom was excited but he just looked at me like he either knew we were together but I was bringing some other guy around to try and cover, or like he just figured out I was lying about it being someone new and was trying not to get angry."

"Vell, if it's the first one, zhen he knew and didn't say anyzhing, and he's angry about you cheating on me vhich means he kind of likes me."

"Or he hates you but hates that his daughter would cheat on a boy more."

"Or zhat. Aw man, eizher way zhis is going to suck."

She caressed the fur of his face through the hologram and placed a soft kiss on his lips. "We'll be okay. I don't care what they say, I'm not letting you go. I will fight them to make them see how great you are until I'm as blue as you are if I have to."

"Zhat might be interesting to see. Ve'd have to find a way to change your hair as vell."

"Maybe we can play around with one of you watches sometime, see what we can come up." She absently stroked the hand he had wrapped around her waist, brushing her fingers up against his watch. "Are you going to wear that tonight?"

"I haven't decided. It is easier for people to treat me normally vhen I wear it, but I always feel like I am lying to people who know. Vhat do you zhink?"

"I think you're sexy either way to tell you the truth."

Kurt blushed a bit and didn't bother holding back his smile. "Zhank you, I appreciate hearing zhat. But I don't zhink your fazher zhinks zhat about me."

"God I hope not!" she laughed.

He laughed with her a bit before settling back into thinking about later that evening. "I zhink maybe I'll vear it, but I have a feeling he'll ask me to turn it off."

"You're probably right. He's going to be angry enough at me for disobeying him, he's not going to want us pretending about anything else."

"He's going to rip me apart vith his bare hands, isn't he?"

"No he's not Kurt. I'm going to make sure he's angry at me. I'm the one who went against him, not you."

"Vell, at least ve die together."

-------------

The rest of the school day was a subdued affair for everyone, full of slogging through the afternoon classes and for some, worrying about Kurt's impending dinner with the parents of his secret girlfriend. When the day finally ended, Bobby gave everyone a break by driving them all home, though Kitty kept everyone nervous by occasionally making lunges towards the steering wheel from the passenger seat and cackling madly as most of the van flinched. Truth be told, Bobby felt a mix of pride and fear at Kitty's antics.

"So you really think I'm incredible?" Dani asked as she strolled from the van to the mansion's front door, arms clasped around Alex's right arm.

"Well yeah, who wouldn't?" he asked, as if he couldn't fathom it being false.

"I don't know. I am incredible after all," she said. She would have broke out into a grin, but the smile hadn't left her face since lunch time. "It's just a guy's never shown this much interest in me, at least a guy I liked."

"No guys in that cave hitting on you?" he asked her.

"Sadly no, it was a pretty boring cave."

"How about that vision thing you shared with Kitty, any of these guys I should be worried about after that?"

"That wasn't real, just something my mind and Kitty's memories made up. No one else was involved."

"Okay, that's good—"

"Still," she said, cutting him off. She glanced behind her, where Kitty and Bobby were walking back up from the garage after parking the van. "Dream Bobby did flirt with me a bit."

"Bobby, huh? Guess you can't trust anyone these days," Alex said with a smirk. "I'll just try extra hard to prove myself better than Bobby Drake."

"No need to try hard, it's pretty easy," she said and kissed him on the cheek.

"Hey!" interrupted Bobby, who was now close enough to hear them. "I'm happy Alex finally worked up the nerve to ask you out Dani, especially since it took months of me masterfully coaxing him out of his irrational fear of rejection. And I know that was a long time, and I'm sorry about that, but there's need to be mean."

"Sorry Bobby, I'm still a little upset that the dream you stopped flirting with me to stare at Kitty so much."

"He did not, brat!" Kitty yelled.

Dani turned to Alex again and spoke in a false whisper, "See, she liked him already then, but she was just so deep in denial that she didn't even notice it, or the little ways she would flirt back. Yeah, I've been crushing bad on you, but I was never as bad as those two were in that dream."

"Oh my god, I was not crushing on dream Bobby Drake!" Kitty said with a roll of her eyes.

"What's wrong with crushing on me?" Bobby asked.

"Um... well... he wasn't the real you?" Kitty said with a false smile.

Bobby scoffed "I bet you would have noticed and been fine with it if was dream Spider-Man," he muttered as he pushed past Alex and Dani.

"Oy vey! I am not getting into this again!" Kitty threw up her hands in frustration as she followed Bobby.

Tuning out the other two, Dani turned to Alex and her grin faltered a bit. "Just real quick for my sanity, how... what... where do we go from here?"

"I figured, dating, boyfriend / girlfriend. Slow as you want. It's just, I really like you, and I don't want to dance around like Bobby and Kitty did with their will they /won't they fighting/flirting thing they did. Totally lame."

"We can still hear you!" Kitty's yelled out the open front door to them.

"Just another couple then?" Dani asked with a grin, continuing to ignore her friend.

"Next hot couple at the mansion if I heard the rumors right," Alex responded, and leaned down to kiss his new girlfriend.

"Get a room!" Bobby added, ducking his head back inside the door frame to dodge the ball of plasma blindly thrown his direction.

-------------

After school Kurt spent an hour working on his homework before beginning his preparations for dinner. After a shower, thorough drying and changing, Kurt stopped down in the foyer of the mansion making some last minute nervous adjustments in the mirror.

"Going with the hologram?" a voice called out from the foot of the stairs, causing him to jump a bit. A turn of his head revealed Rogue, still clad in most of the extra covering she wore to school. Usually she relaxed a bit in the mansion since everyone here knew to stay well away from her, but at school she was constantly on guard and as covered as possible. Kurt was sometimes surprised she didn't wear a veil.

He smiled at his sister and went back to fiddling with his tie. "Amanda and I both zhink her fazher vill make me take it off, but it is a more pleasant sight to see vhen first opening zhe door zhen my real face."

"You sure ya want to do this Kurt? Ya don't have to." Rogue walked over and grabbed his tie, straightening it out for him and smoothing its length where it was bunching a bit.

"I do have to. Amanda's family is very important to her and I don't like making her sneak around for me. I'm not worth zhe risk."

Rogue's eyes flashed with anger and her hands clenched around the silk as she pulled to knot tighter around her brother's neck. "Don't talk lahke that Kurt. You're one of best people ever ta walk this shithole of a planet, stop making ya'self out ta be nothing! That girl is crazy about you an' she's luck to have you. She knows that and'll do whatever it takes to keep ya."

Kurt pulled her hands away from the tie she had turned into a noose, ripping at the cloth to loosen it. "Okay, I get it! No need to kill me over it." The tie's knot ruined, he pulled it off and began retying it.

"Sorry," Rogue muttered. "Ahm having some anger issues lately. Ah just don't want you to throw this away because it's getting harder."

"Believe me, I have no intention of letting her go, no matter vhat happens tonight." He again started to straighten the tie, slapping away Rogue's hand when she moved to try and help. "I zhink your anger issues have had enough time with my zhroat."

She shrugged. "Not mah fault guys think a noose is fashion."

"So vhat is zhe cause of your anger issues zhis time?" he asked, his clothes at last looking presentable.

"Little bit of everything, as usual," she said dismissively.

"Rogue, zhis isn't healthy," Kurt started.

"Ah know, believe me. Maybe Ah'll hunt down the Swamp Rat later and take it out on him." She moved to change the topic. "Ya ever think of introducing Amanda to your parents?"

"Oh, I'm sure Mystique vould be zhrilled with me bringing home a plain old human girl," he said with a roll of his eyes.

"Ah meant your foster parents," she said with a smirk. "Who gives a shit what Mystique thinks?"

"Oh, vell, I vas planning on going back to Deutchland to see zhem zhis summer. Maybe Amanda could come if I vin her parents over tonight."

"You could always see if the Professor will fly them out for graduation, Ah think he'd do that. She could meet them then."

"Graduation," he said with a bemused look on his face. "I had actually forgotten about zhat. Good idea sis." His smiled disappeared and he looked pensive.

She knew him, and what idea she had accidently put in his head. "Just ask Kurt," she said with a resigned sigh.

"Vhere do you think she is?" he said after a moment more of silence.

"Ah don't know. Irene... Mah Mother said she was on a mission for someone other than Magneto, but that was months ago. Ah haven't asked again since then. Would you talk to her if she showed up again?" He didn't say anything. "You would, wouldn't ya?"

"Probably," he said softly.

"Don't tell me you've forgiven her!"

"I haven't, but I vould at least listen. You know it's my nature to forgive people, to let old pains heal. It's been almost a year since ve saw her last, and much of my anger at her is gone. Vouldn't you at least hear her out now?"

"Ah'm not like you Kurt, Ah don't just let things go that easily. Not after everything…" she sighed again, and despite her words he could see her the anger she had just let build up slip away. "But Ah did promise mah Mother to at least hear Mystique out next time instead of just punching her lahke she deserves."

Kurt smiled at her. "So you are growing as a person, good to hear zhat."

"Shut up Kurt, don't you have to go humiliate yourself again?"

"Not yet, I've been so nervous zhat I got ready early. I still have an half an hour."

-------------

The siblings spoke for the rest of that half an hour until Kurt teleported away to his dinner date. They were interrupted only once as Kitty dropped down through the ceiling just before Kurt left to give her friend a hug and to assure him he would do fine.

Of course, as was Rogue's lot in life, the calm built up throughout her comforting conversation with her wise-beyond-his-years brother was ruined right after she watched him disappear in a burst of brimstone, because leaning against the banister of the grand staircase, in blue jeans and a tight black shirt, was Remy LeBeau.

"Swamp Rat," she grounded out slowly, "Ah swear to Gahd if you're listening in to mah private conversations, Ah will make Logan's little talk with you look lahke a tea party."

He smiled at her, that annoying, smug curl of his lips that made her want to pound him into the ground because of how damn delectable she found it. "You clearly have no' been to de same tea parties I've been to. But have no fear Chere, I have only recently entered into yo' presence." His black eyes twinkled a bit at her in silent laughter.

"We'll kindly exit mah presence while you're at it," she said, walking past him and heading toward the kitchen.

Remy pushed himself out of his lean and quickly matched stride next to her. Rogue pushed her way through the swinging door to the kitchen and tried to have the wood slam into the Cajun following her, but he nimbly dodged out of the way. "I t'ink I said dis before Chere, but it's always nice to see you out and talkin' wit' de folks 'round here. You spend too much time closed off, non?"

Stopping in the middle of the room, she spun on her heel to face him. "And Ah think Ah've told you Ah don't give a damn what you think."

"Now we both know dat ain't true Chere. When I go' here, you were hiding in your room as much as you could, listenin' to music and pretendin' de world don't exist. Now you back talkin' wit' your friends an' findin' dat happiness Gambit said you should."

She scoffed. "Please, you do not get to take credit for something that would have happened anyways. It wasn't the first time Ah've closed mahself off because of something bad shook meh up, probably won't be the last. And Ah always get over it."

"Admit it though, it happen much faster wit' Remy's help. You—"

"Help?!" she cut in. She had had enough of his smug attitude and unleashed on him. "Listen up Swamp Rat. Ah've had a lot of problems in mah life. Mah Mama turned out to be a manipulative bitch who had been using meh from day one. Ah couldn't play with other kids when Ah was a little because Mama and Mother said Ah might get hurt, so Ah never had many friends. And now Ah got no end of assholes out to kill me for either being a mutant or not being mutant enough for them. But of all mah problems, the only thing worse than not being able to touch someone without maybe killing them is you! You've been one of those assholes trying to kill meh, you've kidnapped meh, you've used meh just as bad as Mystique, and then to top it all off, ya waltz in here lahke ya own the place, pretended lahke you haven't done all that other shit to meh, acting lahke ya have all the answers to mah problems, generally pissing meh off every little way possible and worst off all, continually trying to get into mah pants! Which, by the way, would probably kill you even more painfully than me just touching ya."

He smiled again. "I'm no' sho' I see what you trying to say Chere."

"Ah'm saying you're an asshole, Ah'm sick of your shit, and Ah want to know what the hell you want from meh!"

"If I may address some of yo' concerns," he said with a nod of his head. "First off, our little tussle when we first met was hardly a death match, just a bit o' fun, no one got hurt. An' yes, Ah was less than truthful when I took you down to Louisiana, but as bad as Mystique? I may have made sho' you helped with my dad, but it not like I trew you under a bus to save my own hide like she woulda done. As fo' having all de answers, I just give my opinions. Maybe de help, maybe de don't. But just de udder day you say that I was right."

"The day you left in the middle of a training session?" she accused.

"Well, I never been much of a team player Chere. But you gotta admit I just been trying ta help wit' what I been sayin'."

"Why?! Why stick around here and help meh, but then piss me off all over again! You have to have something better to do with your life than hang around here because you're somewhat interested in me."

"Maybe. But it a bit more dan 'somewhat.' You frankly de most intriguin' girl I ever met. Dere ain't no one like you in de whole world Chere, and dat wort' stickin' around fo'."

She looked gob smacked. She knew that so much of what he was doing was all so..."So putting this into words ya tiny mind might grasp, ya like meh and since Ah don't have pigtails to pull you've just been making me angry?"

He frowned. "Dat make it sound a bit more childish den it is. I just like seeing dat passion back in you, instead of seeing you pain or being all depressed. If you gotta be angry at Gambit to be more alive, mo' yo'self, it a sacrifice I'm willin' ta make. Dis mask you wear, pretendin' you don't care, dat you don't need someone, it killin' you slowly Rogue. Dis ain't who you are."

"You have no idea who Ah am!" she yelled. "Ah'm not this made up thing in your mind, some girl with problems ya can just sweep in and fix and suddenly she's this… bubbly southern belle whose able to live her life just fahne and dandy even when she ain't able to touch. Well new flash for ya '_Sugah'_: that ain't me!"

"Maybe not, but you dat girl more den you t'ink. You keep pulling up all des t'ing's trying to convince me and yo'self you don't feel somet'ing too. When you t'ink about our little trip down South, I bet you t'ink more about Creole cookin' and Mardi Gras den my old man. You keep saying you ain't lettin' anyone in because you can't touch dem, but dat a lie, you don't let dem in because you're scared ta feel somet'ing. T'ings stay de way dey are, I bet if you could touch tomorrow you'd act de same way. You need dis."

"Ah can't have it! My powers..."

"Everyone have problems Chere. Scotty boy have dem glasses, yo' friend Kitty still fall through de floor when something spook her. Jeanie don't just get a song stuck in her head, she get everyone's song stuck in her head. Even Remy have to concentrate he don't charge up yo' shirt if he touch it," he said his last bit running his fingers down the fishnet sleeve of her shirt.

Rogue jerked away. "It's not the same for meh. Ah don't get a little trick to help my powers. Just cover up and never feel anything."

"How many times I need to tell you, feelin' is more den just skin. You tellin' me you feel nothin'? I know dat ain't true Chere. I know you feel somet'ing fo' me den just being angry."

"It doesn't matter," she murmured, crossing her arms tight against her torso, folding in away from him.

"Dat ain't a denial. We makin' progress. Let me in Rogue. No tricks, I want not'ing from you but you to be happy."

"Doesn't work that way Remy," she said, again her voice quiet and almost meek, resigned to her fate.

"Because you don't let it. Maybe you too far gone after all. Too scared to be happy." He turned to leave, his hands tucking into his pockets.

"You think you know me Remy," she hissed at his back.

Remy stopped, but didn't turn around as a smile crept onto his face. "I t'ink I know better den you want to believe."

"You think you understand what Ah am, lahke my powers don't change everything about my life?"

"Dey don't have to," Remy said slowly. He felt her hand grab his shoulder and spin him around.

She glared at him. "It doesn't matter, they do."

"Because you let dem. Dey ain't all you dere is to you."

"You don't understand."

"You keep sayin' dat like I might believe you."

"Fine."

Rogue reached up with both her gloved hands, pulling Remy's face down to her own and pressed her full lips to his. For a brief instant they both experienced that magical moment when a long awaited kiss begins, where time stands still and for that half second, everything is right in the world. Remy felt her tongue gently brush against his lips and he had just registered the sensation and was sending signals to respond in kind when that moment shattered. He had felt this new pain before, but never to this extent. What was once long ago a brief flash of pain and dizziness was now like a vacuum stuck to his lips that didn't pull on his skin but shifted the blood in his veins, reversing the flow and tugged on his very soul. The world spun around him but still he was pulled. His consciousness was slipping away, but something so much more was leaving as well.

Finally Rogue let go of his face and he collapsed onto the floor. He tried to move muscles that long stopped responding; his eyes struggled to stay open and look at the woman towering above him.

She looked down on him, the whites of her eyes turning black as if being soaked in murky ink. Her red pupils locked onto his, and as they regarded him they filled with contempt and a dash of pity as she searched to see if at last he understood her. He felt the darkness closing over him like a grave being filled with dirt, the last speck of light bringing her voice drifting down to him.

"This is what Ah am, mon Cher."


	7. Chapter 7

**7**

With a bamf and a cloud of smoke, Kurt appeared in a park near the Sefton house, hidden from sight by some trees. He had met Amanda here many times before, but tonight instead of her coming to him, he was going to her. And her family. In the house he once destroyed in a fight with Toad, exposing himself as a mutant, and one that only vaguely looked human at that.

"Hi," a voice softly called out to him from the trees, causing him to jump yet again that night.

"Will people stop doing zhat!" he said in an exasperated voice. He turned to the sound of the giggling and saw Amanda standing at the edge of the trees. She was wearing a black turtleneck with a beige skirt, large belt and matching high boot. "Wow, you look amazing!"

"Thank you," she said, sashaying up to him and kissing him deeply. "Who scared you earlier?" she asked when the kiss had finished some time later.

"Rogue when I was getting ready, Kitty falling zhrough zhe ceiling when I was about to leave."

"Through the ceiling?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

He shrugged. "She gets impatient with stairs when she's in a hurry." He brushed the back of his fingers against her cheek, a sensation she always loved due the softness of the fur on his hands. "Not zhat I'm complaining, but what are you doing out here, Liebchen?"

She leaned ever so slightly into his touch before wrapping her arms around him and resting her head on his chest. "I wanted to see you before everything. No matter what happens tonight, I love you, and I'm not giving you up."

"I love you too Amanda, but what if..."

"Don't. Don't worry, just be your charming self and let me do the yelling and fighting if I have to."

"Do you zhink zhere vill be fighting?

"Always a chance I guess, but it'll be worth it. They'll understand. I'll make them."

"Do zhey suspect it's me yet?"

"If they do they're being very good at hiding it." She pulled back and looked him in the eyes. "You won them over last time, even though you were a nervous wreck."

"Zhat was before zhey found out what I was."

"That won't matter Kurt. Not in the end. We'll make them see that." She kissed him again before he could reply. "I'm going to sneak back in, give me a few minutes before you follow me." She slipped out of his grasp and out of sight.

He paced while giving her enough time to get back home. Could he do this? 'You're an X-Man,' he told himself, in a voice much like Bobby used when trying build up their courage. He ignored the part of his mind that reminded him Bobby said this usually when trying to work up the courage to do something stupid. With a deep breath and a quick prayer, he straightened out his suit and stepped out of the trees onto the sidewalk.

The house was only a few doors down from the park, but it seemed like miles as Kurt made his way down the street to the well kept house his girlfriend lived in with her family. Flowers for her mother in hand, he steeled himself as he pressed the doorbell.

"Amanda honey!" a voice called out from inside, "You're boyfriend is here."

"Coming Daddy!" Kurt heard Amanda answer from upstairs as her father opened the door.

There was a moment of silence for both of them as Mr. Sefton's mind paused at the unexpected sight of Kurt standing on the front step.

"H-Hello Mr. Sefton," he said with what he prayed was a charming smile on his face. "Lovely to see you again!"

* * *

Logan pushed the button on the panel to open the Danger Room door. It was generally recommended that people not open the Room without first checking to see who, if anyone, was inside and what program they were running. The Professor generally frowned upon missiles and debris littering the basement corridors. Sure enough, the light on the panel beeped and flashed red, indicating a potentially hazardous program was running and entrance was barred until the program had finished. Logan scoffed at this and entered in his override command. Hovering over the final button for a split second, he pushed it and immediately flattened himself against the wall next to the door, narrowly missing the smoldering remains of a training drone that flew out of the opening doors.

He ducked into the archway, hitting the close button as he did and positioned himself against the inner wall as he surveyed the situation. The holographic simulators weren't running, but waves upon waves of drones attacked a whirling figure in the center of the room. Rogue hadn't bothered changing into her uniform, instead fighting in the tattered remains of her street clothes. Her tank top remained in one piece, but her jeans were cut in multiple places and the only the tattered remains of her fishnet top hung by a few shredded strips around her neck and shoulders.

She was a dervish fighting against the hordes of enemies, spinning and twirling with kicks and punches. Occasionally she would grab onto a loose limb of one of the drones and use it as an impromptu club, and when it wore down her eyes would glow red with energy, and she would fling the limb into the nearest mass of enemies to explode, sending bodies and shrapnel flying. She hardly seemed to notice though, as she had moved on to another.

Logan waited, watching her technique. Having been her primary sensei past the basic training she had come to the mansion with, he could immediately see the influences of Remy's memories and essence in her fighting. While always graceful, Rogue had a tendency to be a straight forward fighter, preferring to attack directly that dismantled an opponent quickly. Remy, on the other hand, fought similar to the way Logan had trained Kitty. He moved far with more finesse, the type of fighter to focus on speed rather than power and worked specific body parts, redirect enemies into one another, and generally implemented the circular motions Rogue used now against the drones. Remy also fought with a cocky flair that Logan was happy to see Rogue had not adapted. The last thing Logan needed was residual muscle memory to train out of her.

Logan was content to sit back and watch Rogue until she pinned a drone beneath her and began wailing on it with unrestrained rage. "Computer, end program!" he called out. The remaining drones stopped their advance and returned to their maintenance bays while repair robots began their sweep of the room. Still wearing the gloves from his nightly ride down to Harry's, he reached out and gripped her shoulder to pull her away from the drone that even now repair bots were trying in vain to reach as Rogue smacked them away. "Come on darlin', that's enough."

"Stay out of it Logan!" Rogue surprised him by reaching up and grabbing his wrist, lifting her body to create the leverage needed to flip him onto his back. She let go while he was still in the air, using his momentum to send him flying away from her despite the enormous weight advantage he had over her.

He shook the momentary vertigo from being flipped upside down from his head and pulled himself to his feet. "Not going to happen while you're putting people in the infirmary. He's going to be fine, in case you were wondering."

"Ah'm not. You here to give me a spanking Logan? Tell me Ah done wrong and set me right?" she asked with a scowl on her face. She pulled herself up to her full height and faced him, and he could see right away the casual ready stance she had moved into. Her arms weren't on guard, but her feet were positioned to burst into motion.

"Tell you the truth, I don't care what you do to the Cajun. He's been nothing but a pain in the ass since he got here. But I do care about you. And going off the deep end like this ain't good for you."

"Ah'm perfectly fahne Logan."

"Sure you are, this is a typical workout for you," he said with a wave of his hand at the mess around him. "Half-Pint thinks maybe you're in love with the idiot. That what this is all about?"

"She said what?" Rogue's face contorted with fury, the black and red eye color as a result of absorbing Remy intensifying the look. "Ah'll kill her."

"No, you're not," Logan said, blocking Rogue's exit from the Danger Room. "We're going to work out what's wrong with you before you get to leave."

With a snarl she launched a kick at Logan's midsection. He pivoted slightly back and to his right, raising a forearm to parry the teen's foot away and quickly moved to block her follow up attack.

* * *

Michael Sefton stared at the boy standing on his doorstep. He looked plain enough, standing there in a suit just a hint too large for him and wearing a wavering grin on his face. But Michael knew what was really there. Underneath the façade, hidden behind some sort of hologram made with the watch he could see peaking out of the kid's sleeve as he nervously ran his hand through his hair, was something inhuman. Blue, fur, fangs, misshaped appendages, a tail. He knew the boy was more than just his outer appearance, he had seen the intelligence and fear in the boy's eyes before he fled last time he had visited. But standing right there on the doorstep of his home was a young man he had banned his daughter from seeing; a young man who could only lead Amanda to a life of hardship, ridicule and danger.

Kurt bit on his lip for a moment, before realizing how that must look. He gathered his courage and began to speak again. "Mr. Sefton, I understand—"

Michael turned back into his house, the door briskly slamming shut behind him. "Amanda!" Kurt could hear through the wooden barrier.

"Daddy, what are you doing?" Amanda's voice rang out, along with loud steps down the staircase.

"Why is there a boy I distinctly remember telling you never to see again standing at the door?"

"You told me to bring my boyfriend for dinner."

"I also told you not to date him!"

"Well you were being stupid!"

"Don't talk to me that way young lady!" There was a shuffling on the other side of the door, and a thump against it. "No, you're not opening that door!"

"Daddy!"

"No, I'm not going to have you endangering yourself again!"

"Kurt is not dangerous!"

"Maybe he isn't, but have you seen the news? The videos from that Magneto? Things are getting worse and those mutants at that school are in the middle of it. I don't want you involved with it!"

"Kurt and I have been dating for over a year and he's done nothing but make sure I'm safe from whatever problems the X-Men face."

"A year..? You mean to tell me you never stopped seeing him?"

"Of course I didn't! Did you stop when Grandpa Harris told you to stop dating Mom?"

"That's something completely different!"

"You said he was chasing after you with a shotgun. Did you lie?"

"No but..."

"No mutant has ever tried to hurt me Daddy, and Kurt and his friends would never let that happen when I'm with them."

"Why can't you understand the danger you're in Amanda?"

"I understand Daddy, better than you do. I know what Magneto's might do, and way more about what the government is planning than I should. And you know what? Kurt is worth the risk."

"Amanda..."

"Move Daddy, my boyfriend is here for dinner."

The door opened to reveal a grinning Amanda. Kurt could see the faint tracks of hastily wiped tears but didn't have the chance to say anything. "Hi sweetie!" she said with a perky voice, hugging him and placing a kiss on his lips. "You heard all of that right?" she whispered in his ear.

"Ja, most of zhe neighbors too," he whispered back.

"Come on in, dinner should be ready soon," Amanda continued at a normal volume.

Kurt passed the threshold of the house an Amanda shut the door behind him. Mr. Sefton continued to glare the entire time, but Kurt was distracted by the entrance of Amanda's mother.

"Michael, what is all the yell—oh!" she came to a halt and stared at Kurt with a look of shock. He felt a little relieved to see that there wasn't any anger in her eyes, but then again he figured she might not be over the surprise of seeing him. Her stupor didn't last long though, and she turned a neutral gaze at Amanda. "And I suppose this has been going on all this time?"

Amanda offered a nervous shrug and nod.

"I figured as much."

"You knew about this?" Mr. Sefton asked incredulously.

"I suspected. You told your teenage daughter not to date a certain boy, of course she was going to go right out and do that. I did it to my father after all." She gave Kurt a small smile. "Hello again Kurt."

"Um, hello Mrs. Sefton."

"Dinner is ready, why don't we sit down?"

* * *

Even with Rogue fighting with her head clogged with rage, Logan had a hard time getting strikes in. She had yet to hit him with anything particularly painful or damaging, but she was using her height and reach advantage to keep him at a distance. And considering he didn't plan on doing any real harm to her, he hadn't pushed too hard to break through her guard, content to defend and occasionally keep her on her toes as she physically worked out her emotions.

"Stop holding back, fight me!" Rogue said as she began a series of kicks directed to various points on his body. He easily batted them away. She moved in close to punch at his face, but he grabbed her wrist and swept her leg out from under her, sending her tumbling onto the ground. He kept hold of her arm, pinning it against the side of his other leg in an arm lock.

"Are you ready to calm down and talk?" he asked through gritted teeth.

Rogue struggled to pull her arm free, but Logan applied more pressure on it, forcing her elbow to bend farther in the wrong direction. She cried out in pain, but the moment he let his hold slacken she rolled backwards, hooked her free arm around his knee and kicked up, both feet catching him under the jaw and sending him reeling. Her grip on his leg caused him to loose his balance.

Before he could recover she quickly turned over and scrambled up his body to pin his neck down with her forearm. During the fight he had kept his riding gloves and jacket on, but the skin of his neck was exposed, and her fishnet top was all but in pieces, leaving her arm exposed.

Logan felt the drain on his body from Rogue's power immediately and threw her off him, sending her crashing into a pile of destroyed drones that the repair bots had been attempting to clear out of the Danger Room while the two had been fighting. Logan pulled himself back to his feet, shaking off the wooziness that Rogue had left him with.

She flipped back up and gave him a smirk. Already the cuts from her earlier exertions where healing now that she had taken Logan's ability. She popped her elbow and cracked her neck. "Now we're evened up so stop holding back," she yelled, flinging a handful of glowing bits of scrapped robot that exploded in his face like tiny firecrackers.

Darting forward before Logan could recover, Rogue slammed her fist into his jaw.

* * *

The first five minutes of dinner were quiet and awkward. Mr. Sefton was tearing into the slice of roast on his plate, using a steak knife with the same ferocity that Logan might have clawed at Sabretooth. Amanda had spent the first minute happily piling food onto Kurt's plate before helping herself. Mrs. Sefton had served herself and was quietly eating, keeping her eye on Kurt and Amanda hoping to see just how deep the connection between them ran. Kurt had spent the majority of the time nervously watching everyone else at the table before forcing himself to eat.

"This is delicious Mrs. Sefton," he said after a few bites.

"Thank you Kurt, it's an old recipe of my mother's."

Mr. Sefton dropped his utensils. "You should not be dating my daughter."

"Daddy!" Amanda spat across the table at him.

"No Amanda. You don't know what they get up to in that Institute and you refuse to recognize just how much trouble you're inviting into all our lives by being around them."

"I know more than you do, having been there so many times!" she yelled over him.

"Both of you stop yelling!" Mrs. Sefton cut in, her own voice raised just as loud.

"Mr. Sefton," Kurt began softly. He steeled himself when the man in question turned his smoldering eyes onto Kurt. "I understand why you feel zhe way you do. I worry for Amanda's safety just as much as you do."

"That's obviously a lie or you would have stayed away from her to begin with."

"I'm not in any danger!" Amanda said.

"You aren't thinking straight!"

Kurt decided to ignore the two and continued in a firm voice. "Despite what you zhink, zhe X-Men are a group dedicated to peaceful coexistence between humans and mutants."

"Peace?" Mr. Sefton exploded. "I've seen the footage of that training room, the hidden weapons on the institute grounds. Combine that with the threats that Magneto character has been releasing and it's pretty clear peace is the farthest thing from your minds!"

"Daddy! That is not true. Everyone at the Xavier Institute is trying to stop that!" Amanda jumped in.

"By building an army to counter them? How is that peaceful?"

"You would stereotype us all zhat way sir?" Kurt asked with disappointment in his voice. "Zhe Xavier Institute isn't a training ground for a mutant army. It's a school, a safe haven, and hopefully an example zhat not all mutants are bad. But we aren't stupid. We know zhat zhere are zhose who would hurt us, especially with Magneto agitating everyone. We have a right to protect ourselves."

He stopped and took a drink of water, hoping his hand was not noticeably shaking. He swallowed and continued, "Professor Xavier's dream is a world where mutant and humans coexist, where there is never any hate or fear because someone is different than you. Everyzhing the Institute does and stands for is to get us closer to zhat as reality."

Mrs. Sefton placed a hand on her husband's arm to stop him before he began yelling again and turned to Kurt. "Why are the X-Men training to fight then?" she asked in a much calmer voice.

Kurt smiled slightly at her, thankful she was taking charge and trying to keep things civil. "We don't always train to fight. In fact, most of zhe training we do at the Institute is to help us control our powers. It's not easy getting used to the idea you can teleport or read minds. Ozher training is how we can use zhose powers to help ozhers. We have abilities beyond zhe average human, we can't deny zhat. It shouldn't go to waste when we could be doing somezhing with it. For example, I can get to zhe top of a burning building and rescue people before a firefighter, or maybe where zhey couldn't even get to. If I can help, I will.

"But zhe X-Men are trained to fight, yes, because zhe world is not safe yet. We may one day have to fight, to protect ourselves, or more likely to protect zhose mutants who can't protect zhemselves. What happens if we have to rescue a little girl from a mob hunting her because she looks different? We know how to step in and help her wizhout anyone getting hurt.

"And what if zhere is a mutant abusing zhere powers, who zhe police can't stop? You saw zhat when we fought zhe Juggernaut. He is too powerful to be stopped with normal means." Kurt frowned slightly at this, reminded that Juggernaut was not only loose again, but working for Magneto. "If Magneto or ozhers like him attack, we will do our best to stop zhem."

"Do you know anything about Magneto? Will he attack?" she asked with a quaver in her voice.

"I don't know zhe whole story. I know zhat at one point he and Professor Xavier where friends. Zhey both have zhe same goal in zhe end, a world safe for mutants. But Magneto doesn't believe it can be achieved peacefully."

"Why?"

"I zhink he's ruled by fear. His family was killed in a Nazi concentration camp. He survived long enough for zhe camp to be liberated by zhe Allies, but he's never forgotten. He's convinced zhat zhe same zhing will happen to mutants if we don't fight back. I don't know if will start some sort of a war, but I don't see him doing nozhing if things start getting worse for mutants.

"Honestly, I understand his zhinking," Kurt admitted after a pause. "I lived most of my life afraid because of how I looked. Zhe village I grew up in eventually came to accept me some, but I was always shunned and always needed to hide my appearance so I wouldn't remind zhem too much just how different I was. Growing up like zhat, always afraid that today would be zhe day zhey decided zhey had tolerated me long enough, it takes its toll. For someone like him, who lived through zhe worst already..." Kurt trailed off. He shook his head a bit before continuing. "But coming here to Xavier's was a Godsend for me. Zhis watch," he gestured to his wrist, "lets me be normal some. Or at least, let's me pretend enough to go to school, have friends... meet a girl like Amanda. For ozhers, like my sister Rogue, it's a place to learn how to control zheir powers.

"And one day, hopefully, zhat is all zhe Institute will be for, and people like me can walk down zhe street wizhout hiding under a robe or a hologram," he said, pressing a button on his watch to let the image fade away. "One day we won't be ashamed of how we look, and we will feel safe regardless."

He looked Mr. Sefton in the eye. "We are not monsters, no matter how some of us might look. We want our place in zhe world just like everyone else. I would like mine to be with your daughter. She is one of zhe kindest, most open and caring individuals I have ever met. She is amazing in ways I can only hope to be. I wish my life was less dangerous for her, but I will die trying to keep her safe."

Amanda took Kurt's hand, smiled at him before turning her gaze to her parents. "I know the risks, and they're worth it. He's worth it. Their fight is worth it. If I can help I will, even if it's just to remind them that not every regular human hates them. I love him, and I'm not giving him up, no matter what you say. So I suggest you learn to accept that."

* * *

The two fighters were slumped against the wall of the Danger Room, each sipping a bottle of water and letting their healing factors clean up the various types of injuries sustained in the fight.

"Thanks Logan, Ah needed that." Rogue said with a sigh.

"I know kid. Might not have been the healthiest thing to do but whatever works," he added, cracking his neck. "Now what's got you so worked up? See something in the Cajun's head?"

"He's not lying to me," she muttered. "He lahkes me."

Logan grunted a non response.

"Ah know, Ah don't like hearing it either."

"I might regret this later," he started slowly, "but I think you need to get stuff off your chest a lot more than I need to not hear it."

"Ah don't know what Ah'm feeling. Ah have no problem getting him out of mah life, but..."

"But you like him too. Things like this remind me why coming back here was the worst decision I ever made."

"Sorry, Ah know you don't care."

"It's bothering you so I'll make myself care. Though I think I'm heading back to Harry's once this is over."

"If you can get them to give me a beer we can go right now," she said with a smile.

Logan barked out a laugh. "Tempting, but I don't want to deal with Chuck being disappointed in me on top of everything."

When Rogue didn't say anything else, Logan spoke up again. "You need to talk to someone about this or you're just going to be back down here again. I'll call Charles if you want."

"No!" she said, straightening up against the wall. "No, Ah don't want to talk to him about this. Always feels lahke a therapy session when Ah talk to him." She went quiet again.

"So...?" he started for her.

"You ever just... just... WANTED someone? But also wanted to kill them at the same time?"

Logan let out another laugh. "Yeah, sounds like when I first met your mother. That was a long decade."

"My mother... Mysti— AHH!" She quickly stood up and backed farther away from Logan shaking her head and grabbing her hair. "Ah don't need to... that's just... guyahhh!" She shivered.

He shrugged. "It was a long time ago; most of the time we pretend it never happened. We were both doing black ops back then. One thing lead to—"

"Shut up!" she yelled at him. "Just for that, Ah'm going into detail about all the urges Ah'm getting around the Swamp Rat."

"Probably should just get going," he tried to stand but she planted a foot on his chest and kicked him back down against the wall.

"No, you have to stay and listen after scarring meh for lahfe!"

She started to pace back and forth, not saying anything for some time. Logan was about to say something again when she stopped and turned to him, crossing her arms. "Ah can't make up my mind about anything. Ah hate these little lectures he's giving me on how Ah need to lighten up and not block myself off from everyone. Ah hate to admit it but he's making a lot of sense and getting through to meh a lot more than most people. After Apocalypse used meh, Ah shut down. And just as Ah was starting to get over that, along comes the dirty thief and whatya know, he's using meh too! But now he's making sense and pointing out thing Ah'm to afraid to admit to myself..."

She took a deep breath. "Ah know he's interested in meh because it's a challenge and Ah hate him for that, but he does really lahke meh, who Ah am. He can be sweet and funny and caring but he does it all while being the biggest ass in the world! And the worst part is that no matter what Ah decide, Ah still can't touch him!" She kicked a repair bot that was moving the last bit of debris away, shattering it against the far wall.

Logan was about to speak when she kept going, resuming her pacing. "Ah've had crushes before, plenty of them. Gawd knows my fascination with Scott Summers went on way too long. The thing about him though was that Ah always felt lahke with him it would be real. If Jean wasn't in the picture and Ah got his attention, it would work even if Ah never could touch him. He's the type that would never love meh less for it. But of course he never looked away from the Princess so nothing ever happened there," she grumbled.

"This about Cyke or the Cajun?" Logan asked.

"This is about meh," she replied. "Thing is with the... with Remy... Ah don't feel that way. Whatever would happen, it would be intense, yeah, but it wouldn't last. Not some epic love or nothing, just a flash in the pan, ya know? He just ain't the type. And since Ah can't touch... what would be the point?" She slumped back down next to Logan.

"I've had them both you know?" he told her. "I've had the short and intense relationships, a lot of them actually. And full out love."

"You were in love?"

"Spent the early Sixties trying to put myself back together after Weapon X," he started. "The rest and the Seventies was work for S.H.I.E.L.D., sometime the CIA, Department H up in Canada. All of it the nasty stuff governments don't like admitting to themselves that they have to do. Like I said, long decade. Spent the Eighties trying to put myself back together after all that. Ended up in Japan. Met a woman, fell in love."

"What happened, who was she?"

"Mariko was, well, she helped me through a very dark time. We were engaged. She died though."

"How?"

"I... her family was involved with the Yakuza. Just leave it at that. Point is, fling or real thing, everything can be fleeting. You gotta take what you can, because you might not get that shot again."

"So what, go give Remy another kiss?"

"If that helps get whatever this out of your system, sure. I don't see what the hell you see in him."

"Ah don't get it either. Still have to worry about touching him though."

"I know I'm not Mr. Optimistic around here," he said, rubbing the back of his neck, "but maybe it's time you stop thinking you'll never get control over your powers. Everyone else has gotten some control, why can't you, right?"

"Scott doesn't," she pointed out.

"Scott has brain damage, otherwise he would. If Laura can control her temper long enough to survive a day of school without popping her claws, you can figure out your powers."

"Wildthing's temper and mah powers aren't the same thing Logan. Ah can't just concentrate really hard or meditate and let it pass."

"Couldn't hurt you know. Charles is always saying that if you can control your powers, which he does think you can, don't get me wrong, then it's some mental block stopping you. Maybe some of those exercises Mariko taught me could help you."

"Maybe," Rogue said without much enthusiasm.

"You need to stop accepting that this is the way it'll always be and start working to fix it. And when it's time to test yourself, well, I can handle it."

"Logan, Ah," she took a breath. "Thanks. For everything."

"Don't thank me yet." He stood and flashed her a feral grin. "Not everything she taught me is about sitting around and contemplating your navel. Get some rest, we start in the morning."

* * *

Michael cleared away the last of the plates and joined his wife in the kitchen as she rinsed the dishes and placed them in the dishwasher. The rest of the dinner had been a silent affair as everyone let what had been said sink in. "So what are we going to do?" he asked at last.

Margali sighed as she dried her hands. Turning to her husband she folded her arms across her chest. "I don't think there's anything we can do. Or even if we should."

"Don't tell me you're okay with this."

"I'm not. But honestly I'm more comfortable about this than I was before. The boy is far more level headed than I thought he was. And I believe him when he says he's doing everything he can do to protect her. He does seem like a good boy."

"You didn't say that last time."

"He had just destroyed most of the house. He's made a slightly better impression this time. What's really bothering you Michael? Don't tell me it's because he's a mutant. I thought you were a better man than that."

"I am, you know that. Yes his appearance is a bit jarring, but he's just as human as the rest of us, they all are. It's not what he is, it's that he belongs to that group. Things are only going to get worse for mutants and whatever happens he'll be right there on the front line. If it was just him without any of the baggage that came with him..." Michael paused rubbed his eyes under his glasses. "We always said things would be different for our daughter, she'd be safer than we were growing up."

"It's not going to be safe no matter who she's dating now. The world is a lot more dangerous and there's nothing we can do about it."

"It's worse the closer she is to him. We should be trying to keep her as far away from that as possible."

"How? She's already kept it from us for this long, and the only reason we know now is because she told us. She wanted us to know and is giving us the chance to accept her choice, but she knew nothing we could say or do would stop her. Look at her Michael," she said, pointing through the doorway. From where they stood, they could see through the dining room and into the den where Kurt and Amanda were curled up together on the couch, oblivious to the adults in the kitchen. They were talking too quietly to be heard, but the amusement on Amanda's face shone like a beacon. "Has she ever been happier? We always said we'd make sure she was happy too. How can we take that away from her?"

He sighed and wrapped his arms around his wife from behind. "She's really in love, isn't she?"

"Completely. And you can see he feels the same about her. She's in love with him and she's probably friends with most of the kids up at that school. Even if we could somehow stop her from seeing him, she'd never just walk away from all of them. She cares too much."

"That's what I'm afraid of." He slipped his hand into his wife's and led her into the other room where they sat down opposite of Kurt and Amanda.

Noticing the adults again, Kurt tried to pull away some from Amanda to brace for another round. Amanda was having none of that and grabbed onto his arm and refused to let go, shooting her parents a defiant look.

Letting the awkward pause hang for a minute, Michael finally spoke. "So Kurt, tell us a bit more about this village you grew up in. It was in Germany right?"

And with a small smile forming on his face, Kurt began to tell them the wonders of his home town. He knew not all the problems were settled with Amanda's parents. Maybe they never would be. But at least for now, things were looking up.


	8. Chapter 8

**8**

"And your new American Idol is..."

Across the nation, television screens filled with static.

Not just for those watching the broadcast of the singing competition, although the interruption was timed to correspond with it. All networks simultaneously cut to static as their satellite feeds were intercepted and their transmitters hijacked.

After a few moments of this, long enough for many people to confirm the interruption was on more than just the station they were watching, a new image filled the screen. It was one that had become familiar to many over the last few weeks. A man stood on the balcony of a tall building overlooking a futuristic city nestled around a shimmering bay. The buildings reached up to the sky in shaped spires that defied modern building technology, the sun gleaming against intricate window placements and polished metal. To the left they could see green fields that eventually sloped into the beginnings of hills.

The beautiful setting was jarred somewhat by the man himself. He was tall and well built, wearing a black body suit with metallic armor covering his upper body. A flowing red cape billowed from around his shoulders and his head was hidden under a metal helm, his face visible only through a roughly T-shaped opening down the middle.

"Greetings, I am Magneto," the man said, a smile on his face. A he began speaking, his voice was both strong, but charismatic. He spoke clearly, never once showing any sign of wavering or disbelief in his statements.

"I send this message to my Brother and Sister mutants across the world. We find ourselves in difficult times, my friends. In recent years, as the world has been made aware of our kind, we have begun to see just how little homo sapiens have evolved during their time on their planet. They are ruled by fear, not much different than our shared ancestors were. Just as they are still scared of the dark, they still irrationally fear that which is unknown to them, the things that are different than them. And no matter how much we, as Homo Superior, attempt to educate our human kin about our species in the hopes that we may allay their fears, they refuse to allow reason to overcome their primitive instincts.

"Already there have been multiple attempts to pass legislation in countries around the world regulating mutants. Some, like the nation of Genosha, have already regulated mutants to second class citizens, and the push to change that to something even lower has begun. In the darker side of governments, plans are in motion to enact harsher solutions to the 'mutant problem.' The attack on innocent mutants by the Sentinel robot in Bayville, New York is not destined to be an isolated incident. Though that machine was destroyed, three more were miraculously available for deployment during the Apocalypse Incident. These machines are still in production, and it is only a matter of time before those who wish to see us exterminated have the support they need to enact their sinister plans.

"All of this, because we are different. Because we are the outsider that must be stopped. We are a threat to the human way of life, they say. We are monsters. We are madmen waiting to strike. We are not them.

"But are we so different than our human kin? We are flesh and blood. We have thoughts, hopes, dreams. We, like so many others on this planet, want to raise our family and live our lives in peace. We are very much like our human kin.

"Yet I have made distinctions between our two species. We are Homo Sapien and Homo Superior. I argue that we are the same, and yet acknowledge that we are different. But I postulate the difference is the same as how an adult is different than their adolescence self. Or a butterfly is different than a caterpillar. We are the same creatures, separated by time. Mutants are the future dominant race of this planet, appearing slowly from the cocoon of humanity. Just as Homo Sapien appeared from Neanderthal before him, Homo Superior is the next stage of Evolution taking its place in the world.

"But during this emerging paradigm shift, humanity is fearful. The future, even with the small taste that Mutantkind is giving the world, is ever unknown, and therefore by human thinking it is something that brings terror. Instead of being embraced as the coming of a new status quo, we are shunned. Hated. Feared. We are being denied or rights as citizens of our nations and members of a global human community. And soon, perhaps, if those who fear us most are able to sway opinion to their way of thinking, we will become the hunted.

"I propose that if we are to be treated as outsiders by our kin, then let us be outsiders. Let us separate ourselves from their limitations and shortcomings, their wars and failings as a society. I ask you, my brothers and sisters, to join us here on Avalon." He paused to wave to the city behind him. "In Avalon we can be free to embrace the gifts nature has blessed us with. In Avalon we can be safe from those who would pin their problems and insecurities on us, those who so panicked at the thought of losing power they would destroy anything they believed could be a threat. In Avalon, we can work to create the society of tomorrow, for the children of today. And when the world is at last ready for Homo Superior to fulfill its purpose as the ushers of that future, then we shall be there to carry it forward.

"We are searching for you, my brothers and sisters. Seek us, and we shall meet half way.

"To those of our human kin sympathetic to our cause, I give you my thanks, and ask that you continue sounding out against those who feel that bigotry still has a place in our world.

"And at last, for those of you who stand against us, who seek to cleanse the Earth of Mutankind." Beneath his helm, those watching could see his eyes narrow. "Time is on our side. Nature is on our side. Mutants are united and we will not tolerate any threat to our Brotherhood. We are willing to allow you to live your days in peace; you would be wise to allow us the same."

The scene held for a moment before the transmission cut out and static resumed. Over the next few minutes the regularly scheduled programming was restored by frantic technicians who had been trying to retake their signals since the broadcast began.

Over the next twenty-four hours, broadcasts around the world were interrupted with similar messages, each given in the native tongue. It was not the first time such a thing had been done, nor would it be the last. It was, however, the most widespread message to date. Copies of the video and previous broadcasts from Magneto flooded the Internet, and despite attempt to keep them from re-airing anywhere, were constantly shown by television pundits of the cable news outlets.

Around the globe, the mutant debate reached a new fervor, the message adding fuel to both sides of the debate. The idea of mutants leaving and living in away from the rest of the world was seen by some to be a perfectly acceptable solution. Other saw any gathering of mutants as an army waiting to be unleashed. To those operating in the shadows, it was one more piece put in place, one step close to the spark that would at last start what they had been preparing for.


	9. Chapter 9

**9**

Calvin "Mimic" Rankin never expected his life would lead him to an artificial island in the middle of the ocean, created by a man who could manipulate metal through magnetic fields with a wave of his hand, a man who made the island to act as a sanctuary to a subspecies of humans born with special powers that caused the rest of the world to fear them. Nor did he think he would be a member of an elite squad on that island whose mission was to be the protectors of those mutants whose powers would be of no use in combat.

While he wasn't a mutant in the same, naturally evolved way the others were, he still had power thanks to experiments his little remembered father had performed on him that lead to an active x-gene being grafted into his own DNA. That didn't matter much to Cal though, since as Magneto had pointed out he would still be treated like a mutant by the rest of the world.

Gaining full control of his own copying ability was his first priority when he first arrived on Avalon. In the year and a half since he had left the X-mansion he hadn't had a chance to absorb multiple powers at once, so practice had been out of the question. After settling into an apartment on Avalon, Cal was brought by Magneto to see the woman Sage. He explained to Cal that Sage's mutant ability allowed her a higher percentage of her brain to be utilized than the average human, giving her mind the ability to operate in a way that put her leaps and bounds beyond almost all of the world's most powerful supercomputers. This ability, Magneto told him, would help analyze the process by which Calvin absorbed abilities and train him to be the one to control the ebb and flow of powers his body was taking in rather than his body trying to take them all in at once.

Magneto had made the right choice for Cal's mentor, as he ended up liking Sage quite a bit despite the aura the woman projected. He knew Sage was dangerous, not only because of the pair of plasma pistols she wore strapped to her thighs, or the thin scars under her eyes that made her face seem harder than it was. Sage had a photographic memory, was able to retain all fighting abilities she had ever studied, and was able to analyze her opponents for weaknesses in an instant. Cal had seen her, along with her lover Bishop, ordering around a few of the other mutants, a group of aloof teenagers, many of whom he recognized from Bayville. Most of the teens had been scared of the two older mutants, but Cal found that to an extent it was an act. Sage had always been patient and kind to Cal, even though it usually seemed like she was a robot, completely detached from her emotions. As for Bishop, while Cal was not scared of the man, he did rub him the wrong way. The imposing man reminded Cal of a cop and as a rebellious skateboarder in his past life, his life before his powers, he was sworn to despise cops.

Overall, he rather liked the new world he found himself living in. Part of him regretted walking out on Xavier since he might have gained control of his power earlier and avoided the painful year on the run that led eventually to a S.H.I.E.L.D. cell. At least here he was allowed to be a hero, a valuable member of the team rather than just one more mutant kid. With Sage's help he was discovering how to voluntarily mimic a power, how to not take a power, pinpointing a specific power to take when surrounded by mutants and eventually how to release a power to allow him room to take another.

His mimicry allowed him to be a one man army, as long as he picked up the right combination of powers. He had the ability to copy the powers of mutants around him for a short time, or if he spent about an hour concentrating on their abilities he could keep them for as long as he wanted. He never could have their full abilities, at best guess he would say his copied abilities worked at about half strength compared to the originals, and he also found he could only hold on to the powers of five individuals at a time; if he tried for more, he lost control of the powers. He realized now this is what had happened when he had first encountered the X-Men when Evan had brought him to mansion. He had simply overloaded his capabilities, compounded by not having had any idea how to control the powers he had absorbed.

He was spending most of his time these days, outside the occasional recovery missions with other Acolytes to bring new mutants to Avalon, training with either Bishop on the finer points of powered team combat alongside the Acolytes or with individuals attempting to learn how to control their powers when he mimicked them. He was working on coming up with a steady stable of powers, with the idea of leaving his fifth power open so he could rotate people's powers in for short term needs without having to lose a power and go through the process of gaining it again..

He had spent a week learning seismic control from Avalanche, the week before that he had taken Pietro's power and worked on controlling himself now that he could travel at super speed, which he did alone since he was like most people and couldn't stand being around Pietro for very long. Sabretooth was another easy choice for him to get. He knew the savage mutant was more likely to bat him around like a cat toy than willingly sit with the teenager long enough to take the power on, so Mimic discretely grabbed the enhanced senses and healing factor during a long meeting of the Acolytes. It turned out his timing was great, as Sabretooth left Avalon right after that and hadn't been heard from since.

It was fun to have Toad's leaping ability, especially combined with a running start using Quicksilver's speed, but the increased body odor that he quickly developed had him releasing the power without a second thought. He didn't even bother with Blob, fearing what might happen if he did. He did pick up Bishop's energy absorption and redirection powers. It was not an active power unless he was attacked first, but certainly would come in handy if something like a Sentinel took a shot at him.

Plenty of powers he found just didn't work for him. He was never able to pull a power off of Juggernaut for some reason, and with Sage he thought he might have taken her mental processing powers, but his brain was so hard coded thinking without the extra brain boost that he couldn't get them to work. He would have loved to have Revanche's power of moving through shadows and invisibility, but he could never find her after that initial meeting of the Acolytes. Magneto had politely but firmly declined Mimic's request for time with Revanche, as well as time with himself for Cal to gain either of their powers.

Eventually he found a mutant calling himself Northstar among the civilian population of Avalon. Northstar had speed that sadly didn't rival Quicksilver's, but he also had the ability to fly which more than made up for the slowdown. Releasing Quicksilver's powers and grabbing Northstar's, he spent the better part of a week training with Canadian-born mutant, learning the nuances of soaring through the air. Thankfully the way his mimicked powers functioned at half strength manifested themselves as being able to fly not quite as high or fast, rather than simply not working at all. Though he enjoyed the lessons and the new found freedom that flight allowed, the way Northstar was beginning to look at him made him uncomfortable and he was glad to resume the hunt for new powers.

Back on the search, he found Cassandra's telepathy was fun, but as it had taken her years to learn control, the voices quickly started to drive him mad. Mastermind's illusions could have been fun, but like Cassandra's power it took a level of mastery that he had no way of gaining fast and he started creating illusions out of control. Cassandra had found it hilarious when she walked into the training room to find Wanda whispering sweet nothings in Mimic's ear, though the Wanda she had come into the room with had turned red with a mix of anger and embarrassment and hexed the both of them.

He had tried to get Wanda's powers, but had too much trouble making things happen with them. Her powers, Sage informed them both as they tried to have Cal copy them, were probability based. Wanda had the innate ability to calculate and understand what the probability of what she was attempting would occur, and then alter the odds in her favor. It was an aspect of her power Mimic had not been able to duplicate properly due to only creating a lesser version of the power and therefore consistently predicting the wrong probability. They did discover though that Wanda could give the perfect odds for anything off the top of her head, something that spooked her a bit since she instantly knew the numbers without having to consciously think of them.

His lack of success with Wanda's powers didn't stop him from trying, or rather using the pretext of trying to spend more time with Wanda. Sure she was closed off, had a wicked temper, and having minor crazy issues, but she was very cute despite all the effort she went through not to be, had a good sense of humor most of the time, and had been very nice to Cal. Most of the time. Occasionally. He could at least say he was one of only a handful of people she did not hex on a regular basis, though with the illusionary Wanda incident as proof he was not exempt. He did like seeing her hex others because it meant she was directing her temper away from him and it showed off her sense of humor. She didn't just hex somebody, she did it with style in a variety of creative ways. Hexing Toad to fall off a path into the ocean was simple, but launching spraying hoses and soaped up brushes at him was a thing of beauty.

Maybe it was just a thing for bad girls, he thought to himself. And danger. Dangerous girls with equally dangerous fathers. He had avoided Magneto's attention in regards to Wanda so far and Cal hoped it stayed that way. He certainly didn't give the impression of dotting on his children, though he did seem to give Pietro some favor. But that was just in public. No one knew what went on in private. Cal had no idea what stance Avalon's leader would take on someone dating his daughter.

Assuming he ever reached date stage. He didn't think Wanda was oblivious to his attraction, but she certainly hadn't acted on it much, beyond not hexing him as much. Then again, she didn't hex Cassandra that much either. He really hoped she didn't swing that way, no matter how great the images that danced around in his head of the two together were.

He was shaken out of his thoughts by a slap to the back of the head. He had been sitting on a bench along one of Avalon's main thoroughfare as he contemplated his no where near budding relationship with the Scarlet Witch. It had been peaceful, until Cassandra dropped down into the seat next to him as she gave a slap to his head.

"No more of that Cal, and you were doing so well not thinking about that sort of thing."

"Hi Cassie, good to see you, I'm fine," he said with a sigh.

"Don't call me Cassie. Only my stupid father calls me that."

"Fine, Cassandra. Don't call me Cal. And I thought you and your dad got along fine?"

"Fine, Mimic," she drew the word out, adding an exaggerated eye roll for good measure. "Stupid name in case I haven't told you that today. One of Magneto's sillier ideas if you ask me. I mean, I get why the X-Men do it, they still think they might have secret identities or something. Or thought. Or had, something like that. What were we talking about?"

It was his turn to roll his eyes. Cassandra's ability to speak with a stream of consciousness that wandered in and out of the topic of conversation was well known, a byproduct of her not only being a telepath but one who actively tried to listen in on as many people as possible. Rather than interrupting her, he let her find her own way back. "Right, Dad. We do, I love him and he loves me. Way different then you and your dad. Oh, forgot, sore subject, moving on. Or back? Anyway, doesn't change the fact that he's as dumb as a bag of rocks most of the time. Also, stop thinking about me and Wanda. Flattering, but no thanks. I prefer older women. Or men. But generally older and less crazy than Wanda. Did you know she's way into you? I mean sure, completely clueless about it, but totally hot for you."

"She what?" he stuttered.

"Okay, I might be stretching because she's hard to read sometimes, but on the surface she's thinking about you way more than anyone else. Well that's not true; she does spend a lot of time thinking of new things to do to Toad. There's a silly made up name I don't mind using. Do you think that means she's into him, or is it just that thing where hate takes up just as much energy as love?"

He reached out a grabbed her shoulder before she could go on. "Do I have a shot?"

She shrugged. "Better than any other guy here I suppose. She's not into girls, far as I can tell. But don't go running off all crazy, your competition isn't exactly world class, you know?"

"I know. Any idea on what I should do? She's not the easiest to approach."

"That's true. You could always find her when she's out meditating. She's been doing that a lot."

"Meditating?"

"Yeah, out at a park off that way," she waved a hand in a way that told him nothing. "Something about clearing her mind of stress or some nonsense like that. She's the Princess of Avalon, what's she got to be stressed out about? Well, I mean, these days at least. But I wouldn't interrupt her, that's a one way ticket to being turned into a fly and fed to Toad. Afterward she's pretty calm though, that's when I'd talk to her. Keep it nice and simple, you know? Just be her friend and all that. Then again, if I were you I'd take probably her to some secret, secluded place and just get down to business, you know? Then at least you'd have some fun before Daddy Dearest found you and strangled you with your fillings."

"Crap, I know!" He tilted his head back and rand his hand through his hair in frustration. "How am I supposed to deal with him on top of Wanda being Wanda?"

She looked at him with an odd look, a mix of smirk and frown while her eyes twinkled a bit. "To be honest with you, you're a decent enough guy and I think if you made her happy he'd at least tolerate you."

"That's good to know I guess."

"He's hard to read, even without that helmet. Too much time around Xavier I guess, he's got some good natural shields in that metal obsessed head of his. But my guess is he's fine with her living her life however she wants as long as she's safe, happy and not trying to kill him."

He turned his head back to her. "Why would Wanda want to kill Magneto? Not like he did something shitty like my dad did to me."

"You think what he did was all right?" She gave a little scoff. "Make sure Wanda doesn't hear that. Especially because she isn't supposed to kno...oh, you don't know what I'm talking about," she said a wide eyed look of realization. "Never mind then."

"No, not never mind!" he said, reaching out to grab her shoulder again as she started to stand. "What do I not know that apparently everyone else does?"

"Not everyone. Most of the idiots from Bayville know, since they were there."

"And how do you know?"

She looked at him with a raised eyebrow as a choir of voices sang {STUPID!} in his head.

"Right, should have known," he muttered

"Some people have decent enough mental shields that I can't just blatantly walk through their minds. People like Toad and Blob and Pietro do not."

"So what's the big secret then?"

"Okay, since you have it pathetically bad for her, I'll clue you in. Remember, you didn't hear it from me, and you don't repeat this to anyone, okay? I'm the only telepath around here that doesn't completely suck, so if you keep your mouth shut you'll be fine. It isn't something that's supposed to get out. Got it?" He nodded and she continued. "And really, I'm only telling you this because you and Wanda will probably hook up at some point and maybe she gets all lovey dovey and all sorts of pathetic like you are, so best you at least know what you're getting into with out doing something stupid and ruining it all for her. Ugh, you two are going to be disgusting, you know that? She's going to spend all her time writing really dark poetry about how her heart bleeds for you I bet. Like that Twilight shit. Why do I want you two together again?"

"Cassandra, focus!"

"Psh," she said with a dismissive hand wave. "I'm always focused. Not my fault you can't keep up. Where was I?"

"Wanda."

"Right, lame goth love poems."

"No. Wanda, Magneto, big secret."

"Oh yeaaah, you didn't know. Hmm, where to start," she muttered, tapping a finger against her lips. "Okay, you see, when she was a kid, her powers were out of control and driving her nuts. Or maybe she just liked smashing stuff, I dunno. Anyways, Magneto wouldn't go to Xavier for help because it was too soon after their falling out for him to admit he needed help. So he just threw her in an asylum and had her doped up. I guess Xavier found out eventually and tried to help but by that point she was too pissed off at Magneto and messed up from, you know, being in a nuthouse for Xavier to do much."

"Christ, I thought finding out my dad used me as a guinea pig before running off was bad. How long was she in there?"

"Dunno, five years maybe? Mystique, this shape changing chick that used to work for Mags, busted her out eventually to use as a weapon against the X-Men and maybe Magneto. I guess she's big on double crossing people. But she had some lady come in and get Wanda's powers mostly controlled and she was okay for a while until she found out Mystique used to and was going to be working with Magneto again. That woman just can't make up her mind. Then Wanda tried to drop that first Sentinel on him, found out Pietro saved him and went on a globetrotting mission to kill him, then probably Pietro. But Magneto was ready for her and had Mastermind rewrite her memories into thinking Magneto was a great dad, even he had to be sometimes distant because of his work."

"Holy shit! And she has no idea? Everyone knows this and no one thinks this is wrong?"

"Of course it's wrong! I mean, Mastermind, seriously? I'm surprised he even pulled it off for this long with his lack of real power."

"How can you be okay with this Cassandra, she's your friend!"

"She's a friend who is far happier now than she ever was before and far less homicidal to boot. Or patricidal, though Toad is going to push one too many buttons someday and then hey, homicidal! So sure, Magneto wins Worst Father Ever. But Wanda's totally better off now, trust me. That type of anger isn't going lead to a very long life. And look on the bright side; he could have just killed her."

"It's not much of a bright side." He stood up.

"Where are you going?"she asked, a tinge of panic on her voice. "Oh no you're not!" she said picking up on his thoughts. She jumped to her feet and grabbed his arms.

"Which way Cassandra?"

"Are you crazy? Do you really think she'll stop at just Magneto when she finds out what he did to her? She'll go after everyone who knew!"

"Exactly, so the way I see it I have a better chance of living if I'm the one who tells her right after finding out."

"Cal, don't make me wipe your mind. I'm in a bit of a panic here and I'll take out more than just this conversation. You'll be mimicking a vegetable probably."

"Think about it Cass, she's been acting funny ever since she got back with Magneto from seeing Xavier. She's alone more, zoning out, flinching away from people, especially Magneto. I know we didn't know her too long before she took that trip, but she was never like that. What if she's already remembering it?"

Cassandra frowned and thought about that a moment. "It wouldn't be surprising if Mastermind's work didn't hold, he's pretty pathetic. She has said a few times that she hadn't slept well, or that she'd seen something out of the corner of her eye. Could be some kind breakdown. Wonder what triggered it though."

"So she's unstable, right? Don't you think it'd be better if we told her now rather than waiting for everything to crash down around us and having her go all Carrie on us?"

"What would be best would be to go and have me put up better blocks. Killing Magneto would be a bad thing. Not to mention killing the rest of us too."

"If they're as bad as you say, why didn't you do it before?"

"I didn't have a reason too. They weren't pretty but they were doing the job." She chewed the bottom of her lip as she made a decision. "Okay, we go and let you save the damsel so she'll get with you."

"That's not why—"

"Not totally," she patted his cheek in a patronizing manner. "I'll go with you to make sure she doesn't go nuclear. Maybe I can keep her calm to at least listen. Might even want me to put blocks on her."

"Not likely."

"Wishful thinking. But if it gets too bad, I'm doing it whether you all like it or not. Let's go."

Cassandra led him through the slowly growing city to the edge of the town and down a path that had been carved into the sparse forest. They were quiet during the walk, though she let out the occasional noise in approval or disapproval of various things he thought as they walked. At last the forest opened up to a grassy field that stretched some ways to a cliff overlooking the ocean below, and there towards the edge was Wanda, sitting in a lotus position with her back to them.

"Well, go get her cowboy," Cassandra said with a smirk.

"Cowboy?"

She shrugged and gestured for him to go out to Wanda. Cal hesitated a moment longer before slowly walking over to where Wanda sat. Without saying a word he sat down next to her. It only took her a few seconds to feel his presence and open her eyes, her head turning to see who had joined her. Her face was neutral, but Cal had the impression that she had been hoping it was someone of the than him sitting down. "What do you want Cal?" she asked after he hadn't spoken up.

"Hey Wanda, listen, um," he hesitated again. Cassandra had been right, she looked so much calmer now in this post-meditative moment than he had seen her in weeks. Did he have a right to ruin that for her? To shatter the illusions and bring back the memories that hurt her? Was she better now than before? Stumbling for time he blurted "You look really pretty right now."

"Whatever," she said, closing her eyes to return to her meditation, but Cal could see the faintest of blushes cross her cheek.

"Oh for fuck sake you two are going to be here forever before Cal figures out how to think right," Cassandra growled, dropping down on Wanda's other side.

"Cass, what are you doing?" Mimic asked with a mix of anger and nervousness.

"What you lack the balls to do," she glared.

"Would you two get the hell out of here and leave me alone?" Wanda interrupted, her hands flexing and glowing slightly in preparation to hex the both of them off the cliff.

"Two things," Cassandra started. "First, Cal here is crazy crushing on you. Could be love, could be lust, he can't seem to make up his mind. Side note, I've been dropping hints forever to you about Cal and you're too dense to pick up on them, work on that. Second, your entire life as been a lie."

"What are you talking about?" Wanda asked, the blood draining from her face.

"Damnit Cassie, could you have at least tried to break things to her gently?" Cal yelled.

"I just said I've been hinting at your-"

Wanda grabbed Cassandra's shoulders and shook her. "What do you mean my life was a lie?"

"Fake memories. Totally sucks. And not my fault."

"Fake..."

Cal put a hand gently on Wanda's back. "I just found out. Apparently at some point your dad had Mastermind change your memories of when you were a kid. I don't know what you remember happening, but you were uncontrollable so Magneto had you locked up."

"No," Wanda said, her voice barely above a whisper. "My father is..." Her whole body tensed and she sucked in a hiss of air, her eyes squeezing shut.

Cal continued, "When you were released, you were trying to kill him, so he had Mastermind change your memories so you wouldn't hate him."

Wanda was shaking at this point. "No, that's not, he... he..." she stuttered.

"Cal, I can't read her at all," Cassandra spoke, scooting back away from Wanda. "This is not going to be good."

Wanda let out a scream and all hell broke loose. For an instance, Calvin thought he had literally gone to hell. The ground shook, the trees had turned to rotting mockeries of trees with blood streaming down their trunks, the grass turned to flames, and the ocean beyond the cliff began to boil. Nightmarish creatures slunk out of the woods or pulled themselves out of the cracks opening in the ground and made there way towards him with fangs and claws barred. But over the roar of flames and monsters, the horrible screaming coming from Wanda pierced straight through him.

And then suddenly it was over. Wanda's eyes rolled up into the back of her head and she collapsed into a heap on the ground. Several feet away, Cassandra was pulling herself off the ground and dusting her blouse off. Cal could see there were singe marks, and looked down to find his own clothes lightly burned. "What just happened?" he panted out, trying to get his heart rate back under control.

"I knocked her out. You're welcome," Cassandra said, coming to stand over Wanda. "Her mind is way to fractured. It's not just her old memories coming back, there's something else in there eating away at her mind."

"I thought you couldn't read her," Cal said, moving next to Cassandra.

"Right up until her mind broke open, I couldn't. And with her abilities, she's a danger to everyone, herself included, if she ever wakes up."

"Wait, you can't mean killing her! I thought you could redo the blocks."

"I thought you wanted to tell her. Isn't this what you wanted?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I didn't want this!" he said. "You didn't warn me this could happen!"

"I didn't know!" Cassandra yelled back. "I thought her old memories were surfacing, not that they had driven her completely batshit crazy!"

"So what do we do? Is she going to wake up?"

"Not any time soon, I can at least do that, but anything else..." she knelt down and brushed a hand over Wanda's forehead. "I don't even know where to start. We need to send her to Xavier."

"And how are we supposed to do that?"

Instead of Cassandra answering, there was a flash of light and a ringing noise. "Why are you screaming in my head," Blink asked, her eyes going wide as she saw Wanda crumpled on the ground.

"Yep, it happened," Cassandra said. "You have your order."

"Wait, I missed something," Cal started.

"You've missed a lot of things. Blink here is one of Xavier's spies. Oh don't look so shocked that I know," Cassandra said as Blink turned to her. "Take her and Cal to Xavier. Cal can explain what's going on."

"Why aren't you coming?" he asked the telepath.

"Besides being too important to Magneto to be captured? I have no intention of confronted Charles yet." Her voice had lost its spaciness as she grinned at the other two mutant. "Run along now, Wanda really needs his help."

Cal didn't have a chance to ask her any other questions before Blink laid one hand on Wanda and one on his shoulder. There was no sense of movement, but there was a flash of pink light and suddenly he was standing in a well lit study with bookshelves surrounding the walls and a fire burning in the fireplace. Outside a window he could see it was night here rather than early afternoon.

"Clarice, what has happened?" a vaguely familiar voice asked. Cal turned and saw Professor Xavier maneuvering his wheel chair around his desk. At the same time, the door to the room opened and Wolverine stalked into the room. "And Calvin, I did not expect to see you again."

"It's not like I wanted to be back here," he muttered.

"Not the time Cal!" Blink said. She turned to the Professor. "The barriers Mastermind made finally collapsed, but something worse than her remembering must of happened because... um... I don't remember who sent us here."

"Don't be stupid Blink, it was..." Cal couldn't remember either. How could he not remember? He knew he spent the last half hour talking to someone about Wanda, about everything that had happened to her, and then trying to tell her about it. Someone got Blink to come to them, didn't they?

"Yes, I can see your memories have been tampered with as well. No doubt someone doesn't want me knowing their presence," Xavier said with a sigh. "Logan, if you could take Wanda down to the infirmary, I'll join you in a moment."

Logan knelt down and picked up Wanda, glaring at Cal the entire time he could before turning to leave the room.

"Thank you for your assistance Clarice, and you as well Calvin. I have pulled the information of your afternoon from your mind Calvin. Ordinarily I wouldn't have," Xavier said, raising a hand to stop Cal's protests, "but this is an emergency where details are critical. Even if some details have been obscured."

"No problem Professor," Blink said with a smile. "I better get back. I have a feeling I'm going to be pulling a lot more people out soon."

"Undoubtedly. Stay safe Clarice," Xavier answered.

"Coming Cal?" she asked him with an outstretched hand.

"Professor, can I stay here with Wanda, to make sure she's okay?" he hesitantly asked, remembering the last time he was in this home.

"Of course Calvin. You have always been welcomed here, but you left before I could fully explain that to you last time."

Blink gave another smile. "Okay, bye Cal, good luck. I'll be back at my normal time Professor," she said.

"Goodbye Clarice," Professor Xavier said as Blink disappeared in a flash of light. "Come along Calvin, I'll show you to a guest room."

"Professor, about the last time I was hear," Cal started before trailing off.

"Yes?"

"I didn't handle it well, the rejection. Maybe I should have, I dunno... but things went real bad for me after that."

"We never rejected you Calvin," Xavier said, moving his chair next to the boy. "My only concern, which you left before hearing, was having you stay here before gaining control of your abilities. It would have been dangerous for you. But training off the institute grounds, working on your control before having you live among a population of other powers."

"Yeah, I think I get that now."

"No matter, it appears you have control now, and right now it's Wanda we're both more concerned about. I'd best get you settled, I have a feeling it will be quite a long night for me."

Cal nodded and followed the man out of the study. He had no idea what to really think about being back at Xavier's, so instead he focused his thoughts on Wanda, and whether or not this man could help her.

* * *

**Author's Notes:**

**I don't like writing ANs, but I probably need to for this one. It's been a long time. Sorry. Lots of things contributed to this delay, too many to get into any details about. But I recently was reading through Misadventures and remembering how much fun I had writing it and got some ideas for the sequel I always meant to do, but I realized I couldn't start on that with Disassembled still hanging. So here we go. I don't know if I'll get to part four of DPV, but I will at least finish part three.**

**I hate this chapter, always have. I like Mimic as a character, he's got a long history with the X-Men, but has been very underused since his Stan first created him in 1966. I mostly know his incarnation from Exiles, where he was pretty awesome. I don't think he's going to be much of a regular in this story, but he's still here in this chapter, which again, I hate. It was originally planned to be Chapter 4, then pushed back to 5, and then I realized that once Wanda is at Xavier's, there isn't much room left for more fluff and side-story like the things I've had in the last few chapters. The plot is going to take over soon rather than being a background player. One last chapter which will be mostly Kitty's POV on things, and then we get some explosions and fights and some deaths. But before that, this chapter, which I hate, had to be finished. This boring, but pivotal chapter. And now it's done and I'm moving on finally.**

**Not sure when I'll get another chapter out, some of it is already written but really needs to be edited so who knows how much I'll keep. But it will not be the same gap as this last one has been. I will finish this. I'm wearing a Green Lantern shirt right now, time to use some willpower.**


End file.
